


Some Sort of Window to Your Right

by Acantha_Echo



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bad Things Happen Bingo, Cognitive Distortions, Forgetting to eat, Gen, Logan thinks he knows best, Patton suffers, Roman is just confused, Virgil tries to help, my boys - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-08-01 03:35:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 30,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16277048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acantha_Echo/pseuds/Acantha_Echo
Summary: As a figment of someone else's imagination, Logan has always been frustrated by the way the other sides insist on pretending to be truly human.Upon discovering a way to stop wasting time without hurting Patton’s feelings, Logan eagerly grabs it.Virgil and Roman only want to help but they might end up making things worse before the matter is solved.





	1. Lay down a list of what is wrong

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Listenerofshadows](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Listenerofshadows/gifts).



> Happy birthday Listenerofshadows!! I really considered myself lucky to have been paired with you for the @sanderssidesbang as your beta. Not only do I get to read your awesome stories early, but I’ve really enjoyed all our chats across all the subjects and I like to hope I’ve made a friend. Regardless, I really wanted to write something for you for ages now and this idea has been lurking in the back of my mind for a while so it seemed the perfect time for some good old fashioned Logan angst. I had planned for this to be a one shot, but I seem incapable of keeping to my planned word counts, so this should be a two parter and I hope the second comes out soon. 
> 
> I really hope this is a believable story, keeping in with Logan’s character and at the same time exploring how even he can get caught up in a highly illogical cycle of thoughts. This is also the first story for my @badthingshappenbingo card, for the prompt ‘Forgetting to Eat.’
> 
> Story title, chapter titles and snippet at the start of the story are all from _How to Save a Life_ by **The Fray**. All dictionary definitions are taken from google.
> 
> Set post: _Why do we get out of bed in the morning._
> 
> Come say hi on tumblr @theeternalspace

****

### **Lay down a list of what is wrong**

**  
**

_Let him know that you know best_  
_Cause after all, you do know best_  
_Try to slip past his defence_  
_Without granting innocence_

__

__

_~ How to Save a Life - The Fray_

The logical aspect of Thomas’ personality was certainly no hypocrite.

Hypocrite. Noun. A person who indulges in hypocrisy. Which quite naturally led to: Hypocrisy. Noun. The practise of claiming to have higher standards or more noble beliefs than is the case. 

Ever since a certain mistake over the correct usage of a word, Logan had found comfort in the dictionary, in memorising various entries within it. It would be impossible of course to learn every single entry and correctly remember them all, the sheer number of words that existed combined with the fact that more and more were added every year meant that such a task was impossible and should not even be attempted. Nor did every word need to have its meaning memorized and put to the test as some were simple enough that no doubt or argument would come up with the usage of them.

He did not, for example, need to look up and memorise the meaning of the word cat. 

Although, he had felt the need to memorise the definition of allergy - noun. A damaging immune response by the body to a substance, especially a particular food, pollen, fur, or dust, to which it has become hypersensitive - for whenever the topic of cats came up, in order to not so gently remind Patton that he could not pet any and every cat he saw.

As he had suspected, he had been correct in his understanding of the word hypocrite. 

He didn’t simply claim to have higher standards. He _did_ have higher standards. He was able to examine a problem unburdened by any emotional sway that could tilt his reasoning one way or the other, unlike the rest of the sides. Even Virgil, the most logical of the others was not immune to the apparent siren song of emotions, although his always skewed towards the negative and so it was easier with his cognitive distortions to work his way backwards to the correct response to the problem. There was a reason Virgil often came to him in such states after all, he trusted him to be able to lead him back to the correct path. Logan rarely had any idea where to even start when Patton or Roman were suffering from such things, as much as he dearly wanted to help. Feelings truly were the bane of his existence.

The fact remained, he was no hypocrite. 

When it came to eating healthy, he absolutely believed every word he said about Thomas and the improvements he needed to make to his lifestyle in order to achieve an optimal healthy body. He could not keep living off junk food like pizza all the time and while he thankfully didn’t have as large a sweet tooth as some of his friends, he still ate far too many starchy products like potato chips than was healthy. The lack of fruit was an equally worrying statistic although Logan was pleased to note that he was gradually improving. Not to mention, he had to maintain a steady sleep schedule every night, including weekends, but that was a part of his lifestyle that Thomas seemed determined not to alter. Parks and Recreation, would not, apparently, watch itself and while he really didn’t see the point of viewing it yet again, that was a battle he wasn’t going to win anytime soon.

When it came to himself however... well, at the end of the day, Logan was little more than the product of an annoyingly overactive imagination. He was not technically real in the strictest sense of the word. He was nothing more than a part of Thomas, one aspect that worked together - for the most part - with the others to become part of a whole. So long as Thomas was healthy, then he was healthy. Food was not needed because the food was as imaginary as the rest of them and could provide no actual nutritional benefits. 

More than once, he had attempted to explain this to Patton, but the moral side simply continued his cooking, apparently happy to waste time and energy on his fruitless endeavors to create make believe food for them all. 

It wasn’t as though Logan disliked food. Far from it. He enjoyed flavours as much as anyone, and thanks to Thomas’ imagination and his ability to correctly retain information, he was able to savour the taste. There were many foods he enjoyed and certain situations he was always happy to partake in. 

Especially his beloved Crofters. 

It was just, there was no _need_ to eat. Certainly not the three full meals a day that Patton had a habit of attempting to insist on. There were always so few hours as it was and Logan disliked having to waste any of them. Eating a large meal when there was no reason, was certainly a waste and although he indulged Patton more often than not, he also prefered to work through designated meal times whenever he could. 

Like tonight for example. Thomas has a lot coming up, three very different videos were reaching planning and producing stages, he was auditioning for a play and in a month he had to go on a trip, and it was never too early to plan flights and start considering the Tetris that was a properly packed suitcase. There was just no time to eat and somewhere along the way, Patton had entered his room and left a plate of food by his side. 

Exactly how long it had been sitting there, he didn’t know, Logan finally blinking and taking it in long after it had gone dark in the real world. The selection of chicken, rice and vegetables were certainly more healthy than the usual, Logan idly wondering if it was a copy of Thomas’ actual evening meal. Imaginary health benefits aside there was a very good reason why he didn’t want to eat it. 

The food had gone cold, Logan wrinkling his nose in distaste at the sight of it. With no nutritional value, the only purpose of eating - beyond making Patton happy of course, and that did rate very high on his list of optimal outcomes - was for its taste. Cold food simply did not taste nice. 

Nice. Adjective. Giving pleasure or satisfaction; pleasant or attractive. See also: enjoyable, pleasant, pleasurable et al. 

It was not the most descriptive of words but it was worth learning the meaning of the word because of how many other words could be used in its place. At the end of the day there was a large number of different words with different nuances but rather than learn the individual meaning of each and every word he simply memorized the baseline and built up from there. And so, the end result was the same. No matter what label he applied to the plate, be it distasteful, unappetizing, it all ended the same way. The food was no longer ‘nice.’

It was not the first time that he had become so wrapped up in his work that he had missed the sit down meal, resulting in Patton bringing up his plate. It wasn’t even the first time that he had accidentally allowed the food to go cold.

Normally, he would take the plate down to the kitchen once he realised his error and scrape the food into the trash. Strangely, no matter what time he actually snuck down to the kitchen he always seemed to run into Patton. The stricken look on the moral sides face always cut deep into Logan, his pain feeling somehow like a physical slap. He wasn’t keen on repeating the experience despite the fact Patton never said a word about the wasted food but he wasn’t sure how to avoid it. The other side just always seemed to _know_ when someone was in the kitchen. 

Logan frowned, resting his chin on his knuckles as he examined the plate thoughtfully. He couldn’t bare the thought of causing Patton further distress but how to avoid it? The plate could not stay in his room as it was, it acted like real food in that it would decay and start to give off nasty smells. For all he knew, the Imagination would then conjure up ants or rats or something equally unpleasant because that was what would happen in the real world. Not to mention he would look like a slob and who would take him seriously then?

The idea, when it finally came to him, was breathtakingly simple. Then again, the best ideas so often were. Who needed to stick to the guise of being human and walk down stairs that were constructs of the mind, to a kitchen that was the same simply to scrape pretend food into a pretend bin when none of it was real? He didn't have to move. All he had to do was click his fingers.

A single click and the plate was empty, knife and fork resting neatly in the centre of his plate, at the six o'clock position. 

This was _perfect_. Logan couldn’t understand why he hadn’t thought of this before. This solved all his problems. He didn’t have to waste precious time eating and he also didn’t have to endure Patton’s sad face, the one Roman described as Puppy Dog Eyes of Doom. As much as the title infuriated Logan in its lack of sense, he had to admit it was fairly apt. Now he wouldn't have to see it and Patton would still be happy.

It was a little deceitful. The idea flashed across his mind and was dismissed almost as quickly. This wasn't a lie exactly. Or at worse, it was only a lie of omission and he had plenty of studies to show how impossible it was to stay truthful all of the time. This was a lie to ease feelings over a trivial matter just to keep peace within the household.

Perhaps just this once he was in agreement with Deceit. What Patton didn't know in this instance couldn't hurt him.

Feeling distinctly pleased with himself, Logan pushed the plate back to the side, out of the way and returned to his work.

\---

Another day rolled round with the same alarming speed as the previous one. There was never nearly enough hours in the day and although he had collected a granola bar from the kitchen at breakfast time along with a cup of coffee out of habit, while the drink had been consumed, the bar had not.

Then he had skipped lunch, too absorbed in his work to remember to join them.

He hadn’t come out for dinner time and although he didn’t want to neglecting the other sides, it was important that he finish this work first, for the sake of Thomas. They would understand. It wasn’t the first time that one of them all but locked themselves in their room in order to work through a serious issue and the unspoken agreement was that they would be granted no more than a week’s grace before the others intervened. In the past, Virgil had been excluded from the arrangement and it still made him pause and adjust his glasses slightly to think how they had ignored and slighted Virgil all those years, how they had abandoned him for weeks on end without truly considering how his mental health might have suffered. It was no wonder that he had acted in an antagonist manner when Thomas had first started properly summoning them. 

They had improved greatly when it came to interacting with Virgil and although Logan was still not the greatest when it came to social interactions, he honestly believed he was considered a friend. At least, he certainly hoped he was and he returned the feeling regardless. Virgil was a good friend despite his more negative tendencies and absently, he made a note to check in on him before the day was completely up, just to reaffirm their connection and log a little more time with him. He would say hello to Patton and Roman as well of course. Yes, that was a plan for later. 

He kept pushing it back and back, another problem, another page, another attempt at designing how Thomas’ suitcase would look and before Logan really knew it, it was growing late in the evening.

Like the night before, Patton had entered with some food, some form of noodle dish and just like the night before Logan had been too distracted and allowed it to go cold and far too unappetizing to eat. Again, he clicked the food away, still relieved that he had come up with this course of action. Patton would no doubt have been very hurt and would have seen it as a rejection - which it most certainly was not - if he had neglected to eat his dinner two nights in a row. 

The rumbling in his stomach was resolutely ignored. It wasn’t surprising that his form would believe itself to be hungry when really no substance was needed. They looked human and acted human the majority of the time. There were routines they each followed and actions they did for no other reason that because it was something comforting, an automatic action that make them seem less alien, less ‘other’. It reassured Thomas when he saw Patton eating leftover pizza, even if he didn’t consciously realise it. 

He didn’t need food, he reminded his stomach sharply, finally pushing away from the desk and standing. He was willing to indulge his body in a stretch in order to loosen up his stiff form but that was as far as he was going to go. 

The plate was carefully returned to the darkened kitchen, Logan noting with some surprise that Patton hadn’t popped up while he was washing up and neatly stacking it away. By this point he had almost expected it, and while he hadn’t wanted to suffer the sad look, it unsettled him almost as much, this change in routine. He did not like it when things changed on an invisible whim. Logan shook his head sharply in annoyance and really, he didn’t know what had happened to him today, why he was so caught up in odd thoughts and feelings. It was most unlike him, to reflect so much on the past, to wonder about food and now to feel a stab of irrational confusion and dislike simply because Patton had not popped up where he had expected him to. 

Carefully, he poured himself a glass of water. He rather enjoyed the taste of water in its own right and it was something that didn’t get ruined if he left it for a period of time, nor did it leave crumbs or grease or any other unpleasant traces. He could drink in a matter of seconds while turning the page of a book and so it didn’t intrude into his valuable time. All in all, it was a worthy addiction to his room.

Logan started to make his way back upstairs, mind already turning over the next three different things on his list. 

Even as distracted as he was however, it would have been impossible to ignore the argument that had seemingly spilled out of one of the rooms onto the hallway. Virgil and Roman stood a few feet past their respective doors, each open a crack, their voices little more than hushed whispers as though concerned about disturbing anyone else. It was easy to tell whatever they were talking about was enough to raise tempers. He couldn’t see Virgil’s face from his position at the top of the stairs, the anxious side was standing with his back to him, slightly hunched over as was his typical terrible posture. He certainly seemed tenser than normal, but it was Roman’s annoyed face that proved once and for all that this was a fight despite the low levels of their voices. The Prince’s mouth was twisted into an angry grimace, eyebrows drawn together into one single thick scowl. 

Internally, Logan couldn’t help but give a heavy sigh. He had thought they had moved past this, that the two were getting on better, were able to talk to one another. He ignored, of course, his own recent argument with Roman - that had been a debate that had merely gotten a little heated, but it had all been resolved. There was no hard feelings between them and they certainly didn't skulk around in darkened hallways having fights.

At the sight of Logan ascending the stairs, Roman gave a heavy sigh, his hands lifting in the air in an over the top dramatic gesture that the creative side was annoyingly known for.

“Fine Doom and Gloom, let’s just agree to disagree. I’m right and you’re amazing. Amazingly wrong.” He spun gracefully on his heel as he spoke, turning to march into his room and close the door firmly in Virgil’s face as the other side tried to follow, clearly not ready to end the argument just yet. He huffed in annoyance before turning to catch sight of Logan. Pale skin flushed, Virgil’s scowl deepening as he shoved his hands deep into the pocket of his purple hoodie.

For a moment he simply stood awkwardly beside Roman’s door before giving a soft groan of defeat and starting to shuffle along the corridor back to his own room. The blush was still visible even under the white foundation he insisted on wearing for the sake of his ‘aesthetic’ and Logan couldn’t help but feel as though he might have missed something important in this argument. 

“What was that all about?” Logan asked, more out of a sense of duty, the feeling he should rather than the fact that he actually wanted to. This was what friends did however, they listened to problems and attempted to solve them. He cared for Virgil’s well being which meant he had to help discover the root cause of this fight. He cared for Roman as well, which meant he wouldn't simply side with the anxious side just because he was here but at least he could act like an impartial adjudicator and hopefully broker some resolution.

“I don’t want to tell you,” Virgil answered. Logan blinked a couple of times, thrown by the answer. No matter how many times he twisted the words over and around in his head, tilting them this way and that, they didn’t make any kind of sense that he could fathom. Logan did not enjoy being presented a problem like this, one that he strongly suspected was emotional in nature and so didn't have a clear answer to work his way towards.

“Pardon?”

“I mean... Roman’s being an idiot okay? And he’s _wrong_ , he’s so wrong but he won’t see that. I don’t know how to make him realise what he is doing is dumb!”

“I am still at a loss to understand why that means I cannot know the details of your disagreement,” Logan pointed out mildly and as much as he desired to help those he categorised as friends, there were times when they made it increasingly hard to do so.

This was looking like it was going to become one of those times.

“If I tell you, you will no doubt have some ideas on how to fix it. Which is great and all but fancy pants in there will know it was your idea, not mine. I have to prove him wrong, otherwise what's the point?” Virgil explained earnestly, as though his words made a perfect kind of sense. 

Yes, this certainly felt emotional based and so a little out of his area of expertise. Something else he was loath to accept but the facts were the facts. This was some kind of revenge, no, not that. Some kind of stubbornness perhaps, a feeling that he couldn't quite put a definition to and that annoyed him.

“I... see.” He didn't see. “In which case, I shall bid you goodnight.”

“Wait, Logan, you can still help me with it,” Virgil said, striding forward rapidly as though concerned that the logical side might copy Roman’s example and slam a door in his face. This was becoming more and more confusing by the word, Logan frowning heavily at him.

“I thought you said you did not desire my help.”

“No, I said I couldn't tell you what it was about in any specifics. But you can still help me by pointing me in the right direction. See, Roman has come to a conclusion about himself and its dumb, maybe even dangerous but I know he has his reasons and as far as he is concerned they are good reasons. Its like you said those.... he has those things you've mentioned before.” Virgil waved a hand vaguely as he spoke, Logan searching his memory for whatever it was that the anxious side meant. This, at last, was a problem he could solve.

“Cognitive distortions?” Logan suggested after a moment, Virgil nodding in satisfaction. Logan felt a surge of pleasure as well, at having correctly deduced the matter at hand.

“Yeah, that. And just telling him he is wrong isn't good enough, I need to prove it to him with hard evidence but I don't know how. What would it take to convince you? If it was you and you were convinced you had an answer to something that isn’t even a problem, so convinced that you wouldn’t listen to an argument about it, what would it take to make you look at the answer again, maybe come to a different answer?” Virgil paused, lifting a hand to rub at the back of his neck. The blush had, if anything, increased in its intensity. There were a number of possible reasons behind that. Embarrassment, possibly at having to ask for help at all - Logan certainly understood the negative feelings of not being enough on your own and having to call in another. Nerves, at admitting, even after all this time that he actually cared and worried about Roman.

This wasn’t the full story. There was that almost unspoken danger in whatever it was that Roman had decided, something that could ultimately endanger them all.

At the end of the day though, Logan trusted Virgil. While he was stubborn and loath to ask for help most of the time, he also had a finely tuned sense of danger and a protective streak that was almost too sensitive. He would come for proper help the moment it turned truly dangers. Before, no doubt. Virgil would swallow his own pride and risk his own safety rather than allow anything bad to happen and so he was content to leave this issue in his hands for the moment.

Plus, it meant that Logan didn't have to deal with it.

“Especially if you are someone like Roman. If you do not like being wrong,” Virgil added carefully after a long pause, taking the time to test each word before he spoke. His words dragged Logan away from all the possibilities and back into the moment. “Help me?”

Logan pondered the question carefully, taking a small sip of water as he did. While normally he would have found this diversion a waste of time - and in some way he still did - it was important to the other and so important to him. What Virgil clearly needed was a hypothesis to get him going. Logan felt that was as good a place as any to start.

Hypothesis. Noun. A supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation.

He cleared his throat, noting with a little surprise that the drink had eased an ache he had only become aware of in its absence. How long had his throat been sore? It must have been a gradual decline, so slow that he had adjusted and become accustomed to it without actually noting it was happening. It was a common enough occurrence, most notably with the way he had grown to care for each of the sides without becoming aware of it until it was far too late to change his views, even if he had wanted to.

Why was his throat even hurting at all? It should not be possible. It was something to consider, to analyse if he got the chance because it was a mystery and with every mystery came the far more interested possibility of a solution. He could admire fiendishly difficult puzzles such as the legendary Kryptos sculpture where even after all this time only three of the four sections were solved. Logan knew it was highly unlikely that he would ever be able to solve it - for one thing, he wasn’t his own person, for another Thomas had only ever read about it and for another he could hardly devote the years it would no doubt take to exclusively work on it in order to even hope to solve it. But the fact remained that eventually someone would. And then that solution would be published and should Thomas and thus Logan still be alive when it happened, he would be able to read it, and work through the problem himself, watch meaningless letters swirl and transform into solid sentences. 

He was far less enamoured with mysterious such as the unexplained disappearance of the Flannan Isle lighthouse keepers in 1900 because there was no possible way to know what had actually happened. Logan could read over all the available evidence and reports as many times as he liked. He could look at the weather reports, he could watch videos which went over each of the locations in turn. He could read each and every theory that had ever been put forward to explain why three men vanished without a trace, leaving the lighthouse clean and tidy bar a single overturned table. He could muse on why there was storm damage and bad weather yet at least one of the three had chosen - or been forced - not to wear the correct clothing.

But short of a time machine, there was no way anyone was ever going to know. No bodies had ever been recovered, nor would they be at this great distance and thanks to the poetic work of Wilfrid Wilson Gibson and other creative types, the road to the truth of the mystery was littered with misnomers such as food left half eaten. Speaking of time machines, the Classic Doctor Who had its own take on the mystery and while that adventure had happened at a fictional lighthouse the Doctor had quoted the poem just in case anyone had missed the reference. He liked poetry and Doctor Who but it did make it hard to undercover the truth at times.

What had he been thinking about again? His mind had the worrying habit of drifting off on to tangents far too easily today. Ah. Yes. The Roman problem.

“I would take his original point and show the true outcome. If he believes for example that he no longer needs to rehearse before putting on a performance then in turn, create your own show with your own talents and show that his thinking is flawed by creating an experiment that accurately portrays the correct outcome,” Logan explained. Virgil huffed a little, a sound that could have almost been considered a laugh from anyone else, a few strands of his bangs shifting slightly around his face as he considered the words.

“Well I’m not singing. You mean do what he’s doing but do it bigger so he realises he’s an idiot?”

“In a manner of speaking, but yes,” Logan agreed, wondering why the other side had felt the need to rephrase his words, why he had spoken the idea back to him as if Logan needed to hear it again. 

Virgil tilted his head a tiny fraction of an inch to the side and stared at him for a few seconds longer. There was something almost... calculating in his eyes, a deep rooted seriousness - or was it sadness? - that sat strangely with the mood at hand. Normally he would have already been gloating in a premature show of triumph over Roman, would be pleased that he had seemed to come up with some plan that would enable him to ‘win’ this battle. Instead he seemed almost upset at what he had to do.

“That would really be the only way it would be able to convince you?” Virgil asked quietly. Logan lifted an eyebrow in puzzlement. 

“If Roman is as set in his ways as you implied and I attempt to imagine myself in a similar situation as you wished, then I can think of no better way to prove myself wrong than by seeing the negative outcome of whatever plan it is.”

Virgil gave a heavy sigh and nodded, seemingly to shrink a little into himself. Perhaps it hadn’t been the greatest advice, but no, Virgil would never do anything dangerous, would never put himself into harm's way. His whole purpose was to avoid danger, to get Thomas out of situations that he insisted on getting himself into but preferably to just keep him away from those in the first place. He would never risk any of them.

“Thanks Logan,” he mumbled, pulling a hand out of his pocket to give him a half hearted salute of farewell before ducking into his own room and quietly pulling the door shut behind him, the click sounding unnaturally loud. The logical side wasn’t one for dramatic moments, he didn't seek out more from a moment than there actually was but if he had to find a poetic way to describe that sound, it would be somewhere along the lines of pregnant with meaning. As if the click and close of a simple door had meant more than the action itself - but that was just his mind wandering yet again.

Logan was left alone in the corridor, still clutching his half drunk glass of water tightly. For a moment he felt as though he had missed something terribly important in that conversation, something he would regret not picking up on. The moment passed as quickly as it had arrived, leaving him with just the vague sense of being out of the loop, an annoyance curling in the back of his mind that had no place or thought to go. He wasn’t going to solve this mystery tonight, not without more context and clues at least. 

He retreated back to his own room, resigning himself to an hour or two of lost productivity as he went back over the evidence of the missing lighthouse keepers of Flannan Isle yet again. While he might dislike the mysteries because of their innate inability to ever become solved mysteries, they were like an itch, something he couldn’t help being drawn back to time and time again.

\---

The next day was both similar and strangely alien. Logan spent the majority of it in his room, working on all the various problems that kept cropping up in Thomas’ life. His host seemed a positive magnet for problems and dilemmas - which at least kept them going with content for his channel and thus kept them gainfully employed. Well. It kept them employed, would he really say gainfully?

Gainful. Adjective. Serving to increase wealth or resources.

Well that was just annoying. Technically they did just that. Gainfully was not the word he wanted to use in order to describe his own brand of negativity or how he... missed... Thomas’ previous dedication to his old career. A lot of good and a lot of personal character growth had come out of the entertainment job of course. He had seen so many new places, had experienced so many new and exciting things as a result of his channel. Logan had grown a lot as a result of the channel and the videos. He had been allowed to become so much more than mere Logic. It had been a great struggle at times, pressing against what had once been solid, unyielding boundaries between what he could and could not thing, say, do, only to find they had grown malleable. 

He was pleased that Thomas had learnt so many new things and he was pleased that he had developed a better rapport with his own mind as a result. And yet... and yet...

Ugh, what did he mean? And why couldn’t Logan seem to reach it, why couldn’t he seem to solve even the simplest of tasks for Thomas? The list kept growing and growing as new ones were added and yet despite working on them for most of the day, Logan had yet to come up with one elegant, workable solution. 

His concentration just wasn’t there at all today. It had wandered frequently the day before but this was far worse. His mind leapt from topic to topic. No. That wasn’t accurate and Logan liked accurate, liked facts and figures no matter how displeasing the actual information might be. His mind seemed to be in a state of strange flux. When it wasn’t wandering aimlessly from topic to topic, he barely seemed there at all. He would simply sit at his desk and stare down at the page he currently had open without actually seeing the information presented within. Black ink swirled and spun across the white page, the contrast suddenly stark and painful to his eyes. The very light seemed to hurt his eyes, a stabbing pain with every movement, gaze slipping in and out of focus. 

The lack of focus was really starting to become tiresome. 

It was almost as if he was coming down with something, as if he was ill. Which was ridiculous, he wasn't _real_. They did not get ill - but they did, for some unfathomable reason have the ability to create headaches. Such as the one he was suffering from now. A stabbing pain to go with the agony his eyes were giving him, but this was coming from all directions, tracing all the way around his head. His stomach tightening painfully, a cramp like sensation that made him grimace a little in pain. Logan had read that nausea was a common symptom of a headache, among many many other possibilities. Really nausea and headaches were among the most common symptoms of any other illness. Not that he had an illness. Roughly one in seven people in the United States suffered from migraines. Thomas was one of the one in seven, so perhaps it was simply Thomas could get them and so could the sides. But then Thomas could have a lot of things that they - thankfully - didn’t get to experience. 

And while a headache explained obviously the pain in his head and possibly even the sickness in his stomach, the way his eyes hurt, it didn’t explain everything. It didn’t explain the slight chill he was feeling or the way his hands seemed to tremble and struggle to hold a pen. Or the mood swings that had come out of his lack of focus. He was feeling... he was feeling... what was the word?

Irritable. Adjective. Having or showing a tendency to be easily annoyed.

In an earlier video Thomas had pointed out his capacity to be short tempered and while Logan didn’t like it, the evidence pointed that way. There was always a perfectly good reason as to why he was angry at the situation or person or thing. It was always logical and thought out and justified. He didn’t really feel any of those things right now. It was irritation without any reasoning behind it, without any just cause. It was just annoyance at the world in general and that, in itself, made him grow even more annoyed. 

It was a vicious circle and until he could discover the root cause of his original irritation, he didn’t know how to fix it. At the very least, Logan needed to clear his head, needed to get away from this desk, from paper that wanted to hurt him and a light that clearly was defective in some way and needed replacing because it shouldn’t be that bright. 

He almost stumbled into Virgil as he stepped out of his room. Logan wasn’t feeling one hundred percent true but he wasn’t the one with the heightened reflexes, the side that was meant to be the literal representation of flight or flight. 

“Salutations Virgil,” Logan mumbled, side stepping around the typical greeting that would require a morning, afternoon or evening in the sentence. Possibly because he was currently unaware exactly of the time and didn’t want to admit to it. Logan felt his face heat up at that inward conclusion, the by now familiar wave of annoyance rising up in him and Virgil hadn’t even done anything, hadn’t called him out on his words. In fact, Virgil really hadn’t done anything. He hadn’t moved out of his way when he stepped out, hadn’t made some little quip as he was wont to do.

Virgil grunted at him rather than actually spoke, clutching his coffee mug tightly against his chest. He looked about as bad as Logan felt right now, hair rough as though he had just rolled out of bed, skin pale even under the foundation he normally wore. That wasn't the most obvious sign however. It was his eyes that really gave it away, not merely the eyeshadow that seemed thicker and messier than usual as though he had tried to cover something up.

Virgil’s eyelids looked somewhat puffy, giving him a squint as he glanced over and Logan and then away again. With another grunt - a farewell perhaps - he carried on shuffling forward, free hand lifting to mask the yawn that tried to slip out, jaw almost cracking with how large it had become. The anxious side had long vanished into his room before Logan’s brain had listed and categorized those different visual clues, before he had deduced that Virgil had most probably not slept the night before.

It wasn’t exactly a startling or hard conclusion to have come to, especially with his prior knowledge of Virgil and his frequent bouts of little sleep, but even on the morning after those nights he had never seemed as worn down as he did right then. Strange, but it would no doubt go away tomorrow after Virgil’s body had caught up on itself and granted him sleep. 

He groaned lightly, both in annoyance at his slow, slow brain and at the tiny pinpricks of black that swam across his vision as he simply stood there alone in the corridor like an idiot, making him feel a little light headheaded. Carefully, Logan carried on making his way to his destination, hoping that some water splashed on his face would do him some good.

A short trip to the bathroom later - which had lights that seemed to be even more broken than his desk lamb, the harsh glare surely was not normal, the lights made Logan screw his eyes tightly shut against them, hands gripping the sink as he stood there, his whole focus narrowed to simply staying upright. It felt almost as though he was on a boat or a ship, the waves rocking the vehicle. Sea sickness on dry land was absurd. This whole situation was absurd but no matter how firmly he told himself that, how many facts he recited in his head, he couldn’t seem to convince his body to become stable once more.

Needless to say, splashing water on his face had not achieved the desired result. 

When he returned to his room, pace slower than he would have liked, it was to find that Patton had left a plate of food for him in his absence. Well that at least told him the time, it was evening then. There was a strange feeling of trepidation in his chest as he approached the tray set on his desk, almost as though it was some wild animal instead of Patton’s latest food offering. 

Tonight it was pizza. Like all the sides, Logan enjoyed pizza more than most foods, finding the blending of cheese, vegetable and tomato and most pleasing mix. Logan was certainly not immune to the pleasure that would normally rise in him at the sight of pizza loaded with all the most delicious toppings. All his favorite toppings he noted, for a moment wondering if this was some special event, if he had forgotten his own ‘birthday’ or some other occasion Patton liked to mark with a celebration but he was fairly sure it was a normal Friday. The pizza wasn’t the only thing on the tray however. Logan blinked. Once, twice, three times, but the second plate nestled next to the three slices of pizza remained in view, solid and not a hallucination. 

There was a dessert as well.

Again, Patton was deviating from the norm and Logan didn't know what to make of that, examining the slightly sad and soggy looking dessert. It appeared he must have been in the bathroom for longer than he had first thought - another worrying symptom, this inability to keep track of time. Some kind of jam based baked pudding, although he didn’t know the exact name of it. And if it was jam, that meant it was Crofters.

Morello Cherry flavour if his nose was to be believed. 

Patton would have had to conjure that up specifically for this dish because he knew for a fact that they didn't have it either in the mind or in reality. It was added effort when there was really no need for it because they had a vast array of Crofters in the kitchen already in almost every flavour imaginable. In fact, only the cherry had been missing. Which rather begged the question as to why Patton would go to such lengths when easier substitutes were at hand? It couldn’t be that the recipe demanded that flavour and that flavour alone - it was Crofters for goodness sake, any flavour would have been perfectly adequate. But no, he had gone the extra mile, had really pushed the boat out - so to speak - for this dessert. A shame Logan had left it go cold and a little soggy but the texture would not change the taste of his beloved jelly.

Normally he would have sacrificed work for pizza and Crofters, would have devoured it and found a way to thank Patton. Normal did not however, accurately describe today or his current mood. Normal did not factor in the way he felt as he looked at the greasy food, his insides revolting at the idea of putting something so heavy and rich into him. The smell alone made him feel even more sick and no, whatever was going on with him was certainly affecting his desire to enjoy something he normally would. 

Logan shook his head and snapped the food out of existence. He had wasted far too much time thinking about it, and so much of the day had been lost already to wasted thoughts, to useless side alleys his mind had wandered down. The empty plates almost gleamed in the now dim light of his room and even that hurt his eyes a little, Logan blinking rapidly to try and ward away the tears that wanted to fill up there. 

Despite everything, he couldn't help but feel a tiny bit of guilt that for the third night in a row he had destroyed Patton’s food instead of indulging the moral side. This trick should only be used in emergencies when he was really caught up in his work, not every night because it was easier than having to eat. He should be encouraging his hobbies, should be enjoying the fact that Patton was growing, that he was learning new skills as he improved his cooking and most importantly that he cared enough to want to include Logan. Well of course he cared, he was Thomas’ heart, he was full of all manner of feelings. It still caused a soft glow to spread throughout Logan at knowing that Patton had gone to all that effort for him and the rest.

Guilt grew a little more at that and although he knew Patton couldn’t know what he had done to the food, it still felt wrong, felt more and more deceitful every time he snapped it away. That had to be the reason why his stomach was churning so painfully and yet at the same time so pitifully. Guilt could do that, no matter how illogical such a feeling was. Guilt that he was somehow letting Patton down and Logan didn’t like the thought that he might be doing that. 

Tomorrow, he promised himself. Tomorrow he would try and set aside some time to actually join the others. If not for an actual meal depending on how he felt, then for a little time beforehand. Perhaps he was simply missing their company as strange as it might seem to be a reason for his body’s reactions. Perhaps some rest and then some silly banter from Patton would be all he needed in order to recharge his batteries and then he could solve all of Thomas’ problems in one single, productive session. 

Yes, tomorrow would be better.

\---

Morning came, a sluggish overcast morning, grey and miserable. It certainly reflected Thomas’ own mood and the mood of those that existed within his mind. Roman, in particular, felt very sensitive about the weather, about the pain that was happening to the other sides. The feelings of uneasiness, of sorrow and worry only grew as the hours slowly, quietly ticked past. The common room was almost deserted for the majority of the day as they all seemed to have silently agreed to keep to their rooms. Roman used the time to strew, to fret and worry and do all the kind of things that were normally Virgil’s area of expertise. Thinking of Virgil only made his pain grow. He tried to look at it logically, but that just made him think of Logan and the pain twisted sharply in his heart. So he tried to think happy thoughts, think like Patton... and _that_ just made him want to cry all the more.

Something was going on with his family. Something was hurting them and he had no clue what or how to kill it in order to fix it.

Roman wasn't normally one for self reflection. He rushed through life with a smile, even if he didn't feel it on the day and a glow that tended to distort everything around him to paint most scenes a more positive light than they perhaps desired but that was because he wanted good to be triumphant and those he loved to be happy, to live their own happy endings each and every day. He was not however, a moron. Nor was he insensitive to the others and their feelings. Something was going on and had been for a couple of days now, something that was dragging the whole mood down and affecting them all.

To his eternal shame, it had been Virgil who had first noticed something was wrong and he had almost instantly zeroed in on their giant walking calculator as cause. Or first sufferer. For all that Roman would clash with Logan he still loved him dearly and would have stood in front of a thousand dragons of the worst sort - directors - before he willingly allowed harm to come to single hair on his bespectacled head.

It had also been Virgil who had come up with a plan. The exact details he had remained hazy on, and Roman was sure he knew more than he had admitted as to what demon was plaguing Logan. Virgil had asked Roman to trust him though, had looked at him with wide, pleading eyes and really, how could he possibly refuse? It had been some time now since Virgil had been accepted, since he had truly become part of the group, part of the family but at the same time it was nothing compared to the years he had spent on the outside looking in. And always protecting them. Roman had contributed greatly to Virgil’s isolation, to his feelings of loneliness, convinced that there could only be his way, his viewpoint. That Anxiety was nothing but evil without giving him more than a token chance to explain himself.

He trusted Virgil and he burned to prove it, to show in action that he was wrong and sorry. So it had been easy for Roman to accept without demanding too much detail, especially when Virgil had told him it involved acting. The plan was simple enough, the part he was involved in at least.

Stage a fight with Virgil, let Logan catch the tail end of it and then use it as a springboard to discover what was truly bothering the logical side. He was stubborn like all of them and both had known that Logan would never admit to having any kind of problem, not until it grew so large that if started to have a ripple effect on Thomas. Something they wanted to avoid at all costs, which meant resorting to this slightly underhanded tactic of making Logan think they were fighting. 

Roman was willing to paint himself the villain in this play they were putting on if it meant proving himself worthy of Virgil’s faith and trust, if it meant that they would learn what was going on with Logan and then solve the problem. Virgil had promised he was going to fix it, that he would ask for help when needed but instead things had somehow become so much worse and now his emo nightmare wasn't sleeping - was his nickname a little too apt and it was indeed the shadowy demons of his mind that were pressing in on him. Roman just didn’t know how the lack of sleep was connected to whatever was going on with Logan. Not for the first time he wished he had not been so eager to follow the stage directions, that he might have stayed just a little closer to the action in order to overhear their dialogue and discover the truth himself.

Carefully, he looked up from his plate, watching the other three around the table where they had all, for once, gathered for dinner. None of them looked right.

Patton was curled in on himself, smile not reaching his eyes. It was brittle, barely there as his gaze darted around the table trying to preempt anything they might do. Roman was only half out of his seat, empty glass in hand before Patton was suddenly beside him, topping up his drink and lightly pressing him back down. There was almost a manic energy around him, something Roman didn't like.

Virgil was looking more and more like a zombie, as if the emo was truly embracing the extreme end of his chosen look. He rarely looked this bad and whatever was keeping him awake during the long hours of the night had to be something dramatic. He was almost mechanically eating his food, a far away look in his eyes, his thoughts somewhere other than the table.

Logan looked the most normal in that he didn't seem to be in any actual physical pain. Until you looked a little closer, pushed beyond that carefully polish veneer he was so skilled with throwing up, the one that implied he had no feelings and emotions of any sort. Roman knew better. Logan might not be particularly skilled at understanding or expressing them, but he had them. Recently, he had become better at letting them know a little of what he was feeling so for Logan to hide himself away once more like this was a worrying step backwards. He was pale as well, almost as pale as their anxious friend, Roman feeling the urge to make some joke about Logan using white foundation to match. It was swallowed down with some difficulty and Roman felt it wasn't the right time, that somehow humour would not help.

He seemed as distracted as Virgil. He also had barely touched his food, despite pushing the various pieces around his plate for a while, creating the impression of eating. Thinking about it, Roman wasn't sure if he had actually swallowed a single mouthful of the wonderful meal that had been prepared for them. He frowned slightly, staring across at Logan and his plate without truly seeing it, thinking back across the meal and trying to remember seeing him eat.

His eyes lifted from Logan’s plate, accidentally meeting the gaze of the logical side himself. For what felt at once like an eon and the time it took to blink once, they stared at each other, Roman gazing deep into eyes that suddenly seemed to pained, so aching and oh great Odin’s eye patch Logan was in so much pain and how could Roman how not seen it before now. How could he have been content to just sit in silence and let matters grow worse and worse when some part of his friend was screaming in pain.

The moment passed. 

Logan looked normal again, closed off, walls placed between himself and Roman, walls that he couldn’t see expect for the absence of what had once been. There was no glitter in Logan’s eyes. No pain anymore but no excitement either, no joy as he prepared to go off on a tangent about something or other, as he talked about what no fascinating facts he had discovered today. Logan had barely said a word all meal and that was yet another thing that was wrong about this whole day. It was as though he was looking into a strangers eyes and Roman couldn’t take it anymore. He had to know what was going on, what was _wrong_ with Logan.

“This is really rather delicious Patton but I'm afraid I left a time sensitive project on the go that I must get back to,” Logan announced, words almost tripping up over themselves in their haste to be said as he stood up. He seemed to waver for a moment, a tremble in his muscles before he straightened out, grabbing the plate of food and marching stiffly out of the room. 

Two pairs of eyes followed him, one pained, one nervous. Roman was too busy watching Patton and Virgil to watch him leave, his attention having shifted to his other friends. Normally, this would have been the moment Patton would have stopped Logan, would have jokingly told him off, told him this was family time and he better sit his tush back down this very second. Patton didn't say a word. He simply sat there, lips pressed together in a thin tight unhappy little line.

His attention was fixed on the doorway Logan had vanished through, the other sides steps growing fainter and fainter as he climbed the stairs away from them all. Patton continued to stare though, watching the empty space intently as though Logan might suddenly reappear. The silence stretched out, Roman feeling it start to break and crack around the edges, the tension of what they were all waiting for feeling almost unbearable. 

Suddenly, Patton flinched, his whole body shaking as he curled deeper into himself, Virgil drawing a sharp breath a fraction of a second later, his gaze hardening into one of clear frustration. Patton looked away from the doorway, arms wrapping around himself into a makeshift hug. Roman could have sworn he saw tears glistening in Patton’s eyes as they lowered to stared down at his plate, the moral side drawing in a deep shuddering breath. Nobody spoke, Patton uncurling himself after another moment of horrible silence to pick up his cultury again and begin eating, apparently planning to ignore whatever had just happened. Virgil followed suit, his gaze shifting between Patton and the door, that same frustration cutting through all the layers of tiredness that hug around him like many thick blankets, futility trying to lull him into sleep. Something had just happened. Something he had watched and yet it had still managed to sneak past him like a thief in the night and leave him as confused as before. 

He was the Prince! He was supposed to be the brave knight, the hero! Did the others not trust him with their secret pain, did they not trust him to protect them, to do whatever he could in order to make things better?

Apparently not.

Roman looked down at his plate and speared the piece of salmon onto his fork with more force than was perhaps necessary. His heart just wasn’t in it anymore, a thicker silence than before descending on the three still sat around the table. It was almost a relief when the meal came to an end, Roman needing to get out of that room and the stifling, oppressive mood. He would go to the Imagination, slay a few dragons there to work out some of his stress, all the while trying to ignore the nagging feeling that this wasn’t helping. This wasn’t doing what he actually wanted to do, this wasn’t bringing his friends any comfort and he seemed to be no help to any of them.

That night, four sides of a mind shuffled into their own rooms, each caught up in their own brand of misery.


	2. Between the lines of fear and blame

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well whoops. It’s been a long time, hasn’t it folks! I’m truly sorry for the huge delay in getting this part out to you all, it was in many respects something very new for me and I struggled at times with this because of that. But we are here at last! You might also have noticed that the expected chapters has crept up from two to three. Yeah. What can I say? Logan has way more issues than I expected! 
> 
> Story title, chapter titles and snippet at the start of the story are all from How to Save a Life by The Fray. All dictionary definitions are taken from google.
> 
> Set post _Why do we get out of bed in the morning._

** **

### Between the lines of fear and blame

** **

_As he begins to raise his voice  
You lower yours and grant him one last choice  
Drive until you lose the road  
Or break with the ones you’ve followed_

_~ How to Save a Life - The Fray_

Logan didn’t have enough data to accurately understand what was happening to him.

His body seemed determined to betray him. It _refused_ to act as it should, as it always had in the past. He was constantly cold, and no amount of pandering to his new found weakness and wrapping himself in blankets seemed to satisfy it, to convince his cells that he was in fact warm. Logan had even gone to the extreme of manifesting in the real world - while Thomas was distracted by some light hearted entertainment he had already consumed a number of times before of course - and creeping to the thermostat in order to just turn the notch a few degrees up. Thomas had certainly gotten warmer but Logan felt as chilled as before. 

It wasn’t just his body temperature however. It was the almost constant headache, the weakness that clung to every limb and the way his vision would swim and waver constantly. Reading became a hardship because of the physical troll his body was suffering, the words leaping about the pages and refusing to submit to the correct order. 

His stomach refused to be quiet and it was almost as though it was its own separate entity at this point. As if Thomas had watched one too many horror or supernatural shows - which was not like his host at all, he was hardly a fan of horror - and that had somehow resulted in a creature from the Imagination getting loose and infecting him, taking up living quarters within his form. 

Perhaps he had been spending too much time with Roman lately. It was the sort of ridiculous idea the creative side would have come up with.

Then again, he hadn’t been spending too much time with Roman. He couldn’t, when the reality was he had barely seen any of the other sides recently. Logan had rarely left his room aside from trips to the bathroom and the odd stumble to the kitchen in order to fetch a new glass of water. Patton and Roman were almost conspicuous by their absences. The same however, could not be said for the fourth member of their little family. 

He always managed to run into Virgil during his short outings no matter the time he chose to leave his room, and each time the anxious side somehow looked worse and worse. He appeared to be permanently attached to his coffee cup, clutching it as though it was part of his body and a much needed part of his life instead of something that he could put down at any point he desired. Virgil always looked a little... dishevelled at the best of times. 

Dishevelled. Adjective. (of a person’s hair, clothes, or appearance) untidy; disordered. 

Not his favourite definition because it simply directed you to other words instead of cleanly describing the meaning itself but he found that the word itself was just too pleasing to say and hear for him to discard it completely simply because the meaning was not as precise as he would have liked. It just meant he had to learn another meaning in the eventuality that he was challenged on the correct usage of the word. 

Untidy. Adjective. Not arranged neatly and in order. 

After all, dishevelled summed up Virgil perfectly, encapsulating all that annoyed Logan about the anxious side. From the way in which he would slouch around in his oversized hoodie - hunched over and that was terrible back posture - all the way to his hair that forever hung over his eyes. How Virgil saw anything was beyond Logan’s lack of understanding. Not to mention the worrying lack of a tie that would have truly set Virgil apart from the others. 

Now though, now Logan was coming to realise that however dishevelled or untidy that Virgil had looked before, it was nothing compared to whatever was making him act in the way he currently was. The dark patches under his eyes could no longer be explained away as merely eye shadow, not with the depth and intensity of the colour there. His hair was almost plastered against his skull now, no longer merely content with obscuring Virgil’s vision it instead appeared greasy and unkempt, as though water and cleaning was a concept that was no longer understood. The clothes Virgil wore became increasingly wrinkled, as if he no longer cared as to his appearance. Which was ridiculous. 

Every piece of evidence Logan possessed pointed to the opposite conclusion being drawn; that Virgil cared a lot about how others perceived him and would dress to reflect that. His chosen style might not have been to Logan’s liking but there was no doubt in his mind that Virgil made an effort in his own way, with his appearance. Now, he was not. 

Perhaps most worrying change in Virgil of all however was a loss of motor control. He had seen him stumble and bump into walls and corners that had not changed their dimensions. 

The last time Logan had met him, he had almost literally bumped into him. Virgil had misjudged a corner, clipping the edge of the wall with his shoulder and sending him stumbling a little to his side and almost into Logan who had been heading the other direction, a glass of room temperature water in his hands. Water was about the only thing his stomach seemed capable of accepting and it had the added - yet pointless - benefit of soothing his throat. 

His own reflexes had not been what they should have been, Logan unable to prevent his glass from spilling, half of the contents sloshing to the ground. It was just fortunate that the ever present coffee cup had, on this occasion, been empty, Virgil on his way down to the kitchen in order to refill it. 

They stared at each other, Logan trying to resist the urge to cough, a terrible tickling sensation building up in the base of his throat. Virgil had actually started speaking first, a rare enough feat for him at the best of times, let alone recently. He wasn’t sleeping he had announced, mumbling some number that had flown right over Logan’s head. Not sleeping was unhealthy to Thomas and yet it seemed as though Virgil was the one paying the price. He was really going to have to talk to their host about that because the only reason Logan could come to as to why the lack of sleep was affecting an imaginary construct was because Thomas wasn’t sleeping in turn. At least, he had drawn the conclusion that Thomas hadn’t been sleeping, there was no way for him to be completely sure. 

Logan hadn’t seen much of Thomas recently to be fair. He was unable to function properly for whatever reason and as such, he knew he would be of no assistance to Thomas in this state. Unable to perform his duties to the best of his abilities would only hinder Thomas and so Logan had stayed in his room, avoiding everyone. He made sure his influence was still felt of course, he had no desire to damage Thomas further but until he had discovered the root cause of whatever was damaging him, he was loath to interact with his host in case he made things worse. For himself or for Thomas, Logan didn’t know yet. Only that making things worse would be an obvious bad thing.

It was just... highly frustrating.

Frustrate. Verb. 

1\. Prevent (a plan or attempted action) from progressing, succeeding, or being fulfilled. 

2\. Cause (someone) to feel upset or annoyed as a result of being unable to change or achieve something. 

While the different aspects of Thomas’ mind corresponded to different miniature parts of a personality within the mind in the form of Logan, Patton, Roman, Virgil - and... others, that Logan was loath to even think their names in case it somehow summoned them to the more active corners of the mind and possibly brought them to the attention of their host - they were not complete persons in their own right. 

The others all had flaws of their own which prevented them from being considered human. 

There was no _reason_ for any of this. Unless Thomas was ill but then it shouldn’t be effecting him. Thomas’ illnesses tended to rebound on Virgil alone out of the sides that he would consider the ‘main’ aspects of the personality which made up their host. It was Virgil who would cough and splutter, who would shiver under a mountain of blankets. Logan did not like to think about how for so long he would have endured those symptoms on his own. How he would have hidden his worst days as best he could out of the not unreasonable expectation that they would be cold to him. 

Logan had never understood the pain that being isolated had brought Virgil, he had never been able to come close to comprehending what the anxious side had suffered on his own all those years, a feeling that was no doubt made worse by the fact that he longed for nothing more than to be accepted and included. 

If that was what emotions brought, he was rather grateful to be spared the ordeal of feelings. The fact remained that Virgil was always destined to carry the burden of Thomas’ scars and his worst days, physically and mentally. It was not fair to Virgil that he alone had to fight that battle.

Life was however, not fair. 

Nor did it explain what was happening right now. Evidence had proved time and time again that they were not real, that since they were mere fragments of Thomas’ whole personality. They had powers that were far beyond the reach of a human. Roman of course had the whole power of the Imagination at his fingertips, could conjure almost anything and everything that his little demented brain could think of. 

Logan, in turn could learn and retain knowledge that Thomas himself had no concept of. Much to Logan’s own intense disappointment. He couldn’t even influence Thomas enough to ensure that he went and studied the topics that were truly fascinating. For all his talk of taking a course in astronomy, he had yet to actually get around to doing just that because something more pressing - more silly - always seemed to get in the way. 

They were not human. They were not even alive and their own existence was fundamentally tied up in the concept of Thomas even giving them the ability to be. He could chosen to ignore them one day and eventually they would become nothing more than a faint voice in the back of the mind, unable to conjure their own forms into being and certainly unable to wander around a house inside of a mind. None of it would be here anymore. None of them, would be here anymore. When Thomas eventually died, if they still existed, they would, in their own way die too. 

Proven evidence didn’t appear to sit well with the reality of what was actually happening here however. 

His mind showed equal signs of treachery and that was the unkindest cut of all. The lack of concentration, the inability to focus had frustrated him greatly but it had only gotten worse as his physical condition deteriorated. It had become next to impossible for him to work on things that he _needed_ to work on. Deadlines had to met and could not be ignored simply because his mind didn’t want to work. Why didn’t his mind want to work? It had always been so eager to achieve things before. 

All he could really think about was food of all things.

Almost every conceivable item of food had danced through his mind at one point or another recently. Things from savoury items all the way down to sweet ones, foods that he hadn’t thought of in years coming to mind. The soup Thomas’ mother used to make when he was sick. Those cheap chocolate and rice paper sticks that were strangely delicious, the ones you could buy before the government woke up and realised that letting children eat sweets that were blatant cigarette propaganda was perhaps not the wisest course of action. Thoughts would swirl and fixate on more recent food discoveries as well. His Crofters of course, all the many flavours, including the incorrectly named but still delicious Loganberry. He would think of freshly made bread, still warm from the oven, pulled into chunks and dipped into homemade pumpkin soup. 

Logan might have actually given in, reexamined his original hypothesis and thought maybe, just maybe he was hungry, except the actual scent of cooked food or any serious thought about going to get food just made his stomach spasm even more painfully, cramping up and Logan had to sit there, hand clamped over his mouth, drawing in deep, calming breaths through his nose until the more intense nausea passed. 

Hunger. Noun. A feeling of discomfort or weakness caused by lack of food, coupled with the desire to eat. 

How could Logan be hungry when he lacked the desire to eat? A definition was not something you could cherry pick parts from as you desired and ignore the rest - cherries, oh, cherry cobbler, cherry pie, cherry jelly. Vanilla and cherry ice cream with actual pieces of cherry in the thick, gooey sauce that was rippled through the whole tub.

There his mind went, thinking about food again. It was infuriating and it was wrong. It almost made him want to cry. If he was emotional, he might very well have given in to that urge. Logan gripped his pen tighter in his left hand and tried to approach the problem properly.

He wasn’t emotional, so he didn’t cry. He wasn’t hungry as he had proven by the intense nausea and stomach cramps that assaulted him, so he didn't need to eat. In fact, he really didn't want to eat, the thought in any real, non abstract way of food created such a reaction that the idea was laughable. He wasn't the sort to laugh, so he didn’t. 

He could feel a heightened sense of tiredness through, an ache that had spread throughout his body, all the way to his eyelids. If he was given to a dramatic turn of phrase, he might have likened the sensation to weights pressed against his eyes, draining him of what little energy he still possessed and making him want nothing more than to have another six hour nap. It would be an uneasy sleep though, torn back into consciousness every hour or so until he gave up and dragged himself upright, only to begin the whole sorry cycle all over again.

Heat surged up in him, Logan drawing in a sharp breath at the sensation, something he suspected was similar to anger - but impossible, since anger was an emotion. This whole thing was getting wildly out of hand, Logan forcing that strange hotness back down inside of him, pushing it away and trying to lock it in the deepest, darkest corner of his mind where it couldn’t trouble him further. 

Logic would soothe the troubled waters. Logic would poor cooling water over the fire and give him all the answers he wanted. There was nothing to be concerned about and how matter the answer, he would be able to handle it because at least it would be facts. He could handle facts, no matter how unpleasant. And after all, he was logic. Logic. He had to think of this logically. If he could follow the trail then he would be able to work things out. Forget about the food, forget about the pain as something inward and instead start from a different point. 

That had been his problem all along. Logan had been so intent on the minute, on studying himself as the reason for why he was feeling the way in which he was, that he had neglected to consider the concept that outward forces could be at play. It was, he was loath to admit, one of his few flaws. He could sometimes become so stubborn, so caught up in one idea that he struggled to look at it from another perspective. Logan was going to try that now. 

If he himself was not the cause, then what could be? 

Was there some illness at play here? Perhaps Thomas was truly sick, was suffering from some dramatic illness that went beyond the usual flu or sickness and diarrhea bug. No, surely Patton or Roman would have been affected too and while he hadn't seen much of them, he had seen enough to know they were not physically damaged. Neither seemed particularly... well adjusted, but then they were both unusual to start with and he was not well versed in all of their little forbiles. For all he knew, they were hiding away how they were feeling in order to not worry the others. That was certainly Patton’s modus operandi, to push the more negative things away and hope that it wouldn’t happen because he just wasn’t thinking about it. He really needed to find out if that worked or not. 

Which meant, it was possible there was an illness, that had started in Virgil, as it always did and had grown severe enough to damage Logan and cause this. If it carried on it would no doubt spread to Patton and Roman, presuming that it hadn’t already. But what possible illness could affect anxiety and logic? Nothing good, that was for sure. 

A list of possible illness rose in his mind, ones that almost certainly would end in death. Or some form of terrible illness that would result in life changing, bodily harm or disability. There were other, less drastic potential outcomes true, but that was only because most illness came with some form of loss of critical thinking. It was just that whenever Thomas was ill and even delirious, it had never truly affected Logan before. 

That was the answer. It had to be. 

Logan felt a small smile curl onto his lips as that familiar sense of near smug satisfaction rolled through him at knowing once again he had found the answer and solved the puzzle. It might be a terrible solution and it would no doubt cause increased anxiety and worry throughout the mind as a whole but it was at least the answer and there was something positive to be gained from that alone. 

Logic, once again had prevailed, despite the many obstacles that had been placed in his path. The pleased are finally being right almost offset the all round general misery he was feeling, before it faded as a handful of problems rose up to challenge his diagnostic. 

No, that didn't make sense, it had _started_ in Logan, not Virgil. He could remember that much at least. He had started to feel the changes before Virgil, because the anxious side had seemed perfectly fine when he had run into him after that argument with Roman. Even the fight itself had seemed normal because while they all got on a lot better these days there would always be clashes because nobody was willing to back down on what they believed was right. The stakes were far too high to be able to back down, not when the rewards included Thomas’ attention, Thomas making the choices that each side wanted him to make. They all wanted what was best for him of course, it was just some had more clear views on the correct way to go about that. Virgil meant well and Virgil had been well when he had defended his views, whatever they had actually been. 

Thomas wasn’t ill, the only evidence he had to support such a theory was his own condition and that was not good enough to be able to form such a conclusion with one feeble pieces of evidence alone. 

Not good enough, in this state he was never good enough. The best way to solve this issue would be to call the others and talk to them about it, to see if there were things he had been unable to gather from his own point of view. They might have seen something that he had been unable to notice. Not that he had missed anything because of a mistake, but simply because not even Logan could be everywhere at once. More eyes on a problem should be a good thing. 

That would mean admitting to them there was something wrong however. Even greater than that, it would mean admitting that he wasn’t able to work through the problem on his own and solve it, it would mean admitting he was weak. Stupid. 

Logan had occasionally admitted to such a thing of course, he had even done so in front of Thomas. If a motion had been successfully completed once then it stood to reason that it could be recreated and completed correctly as needed. It was just... he would have to admit it again, would have to tell them that here was yet another problem that he could not solve on his own. What good was a logic that was incapable of solving a problem that was connected to himself so much? 

Logan knew that he should tell them. Just as he knew he almost certainly wouldn’t, that he would probably chicken out - roast chicken dinner, complete with all the trimmings, pigs in blankets, stuffing, roast potatoes, thick gravy and all the vegetables they can convince Thomas to eat. Fried chicken, so bad for you, so bad for Thomas and yet even Logan cannot deny that the taste on occasion outweighed the terrible heart disasters that could so easily be a direct result of such indulgences. Chicken flavoured anything, spicy chicken wings, grilled chicken wrap for the days in which they had managed to convince Thomas to embrace the healthier food. His host was getting so much better at that, lots of healthy lean grilled chicken in pasta, salad, rice... 

There he was. Thinking about food _again_.

That same rush of energy from before flooded through him, his heart pounding, his hand tightening around the object in his hand. Logan couldn’t think, couldn’t focus, couldn’t even remember what he was holding as he lifted his arm and tossed the object as hard as he could in front of him. Pen sailed through the air, bouncing off the wall to clatter down and rest innocently enough on the carpet near the door. Logan couldn’t help the flinch which ran the entirety of his body at that display of vulgar behaviour. 

He didn’t feel better for indulging in such childish antics. Not to mention he was going to have to somehow find the energy to get up and retrieve his pen. Or summon a new one, but summoning things took energy - if there was one thing that truly impressed Logan about Roman, it was the way in which he was able to conjure up all manner of things and never once betray any sign of exhaustion. Logan could create books, flashcards, maps and graphs quite easily but anything much larger and he started to struggle. He could never create the whole worlds that Roman was able to spin so effortlessly into being. They might work on rules that made no sense of Logan, gravity barely functioning, light becoming hard enough to walk on, but by and large the rules they followed were consistent enough. 

Logan didn’t really have the energy to spare right now to conjure up a new writing implement. Plus, that was his favourite pen. Patton had gifted it to him, but mere nostalgia didn't explain his attachment to it. It was perfectly crafted, designed to fit his hand perfectly. Dark blue with specks of gold, white and red scattered across the surface, dots that he had instantly realised were no mere random patterns but instead the stars in the night sky. And not just random constellations that had no business being in the same patch of sky together, but ones that were logical.

Virgil and Roman had both helped in the design of it apparently, Virgil working out which constellations needed to be scattered across the pen in order to create the night sky on the day the fans had declared to be Logan’s birthday, and Roman actually creating the design so that it was small enough to fit on the pen and yet large enough for the constellations to make sense. A lot of the night had been lost as a result but there was enough for him to know what it was. 

Privately, he considered the time and effort they had put into creating the pen a waste and yet... and yet he could not deny that he found it a pleasurable item to own. 

Logan breathed out heavily through his nose and tried to work out what he was going to do next. Moving held absolutely no appeal to him. As much as he wanted to collect the pen, his desire to remain still was even stronger. Making a new pen was equally out. Perhaps he could do some work without it. There was, after all, so much to do. There was always so much to do and never enough time to do it in. There had to be plenty of things he needed to do which would not require him to write anything. Thomas needed to go grocery shopping later today. He could have him go through the food he already had so that he didn’t come back with yet another bag of m&m’s despite already having two in the cupboard. 

A pen would be useful for that.

Well, perhaps he could go over the schedule for the next few weeks, work out what videos they wanted to focus on next. There were many ideas from Roman and far too many of them were too ridiculous to even consider properly. 

They needed to be removed before he could start work on actually taking the time to examine the ones which were not too outlandish. Even then, he would have to work hard on determining if they were even feasible with the budgetary restraints that governed Thomas’ work. Then matters such as if they were physically capable of performing it, if they could find a workable time where everyone involved would be able to participate. After all of that, who had time to look at the actual creative aspect of the idea itself? That was Roman’s job and Logan knew it was not his area, so he simply stuck to what he knew best, what he was good at. It was exhausting and would require a lot of work but the satisfaction of crafting a working idea from the pieces he was given, more than made up for it. 

A pen would be useful for that too.

Just like the next five ideas he came up with and why was he incapable of discovering one single thing he could do that didn’t require writing of any kind? Sometimes, he could go whole days without having to make a list. They were horrible, frightening days true, but there were still days when there had been no pressing need to craft anything. Logan had always managed to keep himself busy in those situations, this must be yet another side effect of his stupid bizarre condition. 

He could always open up his laptop of course. Logan prefered the feel of a pen in hand, watching the ink flow and form the words he thought of over the sight of words on a screen but he had to admit there was something pleasing about typing. All those letters in exactly the same font, same size, space spacing between each and every letter. Still, Logan found himself hesitating on actually doing that. It would involve moving in order to fetch the laptop which was in the desk drawer and he would have to waste time and energy collecting it, plugging it in, bending down in order to attach the wires. Even when he finally got it all up and running, the harsh glare of the screen would probably only hurt his eyes further. 

Fine. Instead, he could-

“Logan?” 

The soft voice had him looking up from the papers that were scattered across his desk, page after page of work that he had been examining without actually taking anything in as he had mulled over the various possibilities. Patton stood by his open door, one hand half raised as though to knock, Logan unable to remember if he had left it open himself or if it had been shut and the other side had pushed it open after not getting a response.

He hadn’t even been aware of a knock in the first place. How long had he been sitting here? It felt like mere minutes and yet the sun was certainly shining from a different angle than when he had thrown the pen in - frustration. Annoyance at a push, nothing more. 

Short term memory issues, lack of awareness of surroundings... he had to add those to the list of symptoms 

“Lo?” 

It sounded most unlike Patton. While he could be quiet when the situation called for it, he was far more often to be found giggling or brightly talking about one inane thing or another. No, that was uncalled for. Sometimes Patton was perfectly capable of making valid points and he should not generalise into negativity simply because a lot of the time the points were less so. Even terrible things were quite often said in a far too cheerful tone of voice. 

To hear him sound so... uncertain now, upset Logan. It upset him and he didn’t quite know why that was the case, didn’t understand why that made the already painful lump in his throat constrict some more, but he was not a fan of it regardless. Upset was not the right word either. Upset had connotations that Logan did approve of. Upset implied things that were simply incorrect, but his mind felt as though it was coated in ice that had then been rained on, making it even slipper. Any attempt to go near just had him sliding about, unable to gain purchase and claw himself back into some sense of himself. 

His pen was still lying discarded on the floor. 

Logan simply sat there in dumb - no, mute - silence - watching as Patton bent down and slowly picked up the pen from where it had landed, the moral side’s head dipped a little as he stared down at it, slowly turning the pen over and over in his hands. This would not do. This was most unlike him and Logan refused to stand - or sit - for it any longer. He was the logical side for a reason, he would push aside all these confusing and unnecessarily thoughts and instead focus on what mattered. 

All that mattered right now was the pure problem. Or, in this case, the conversation he seemed to be having. He still hadn’t acknowledged Patton’s presence. 

“Patton, hello,” Logan greeted, pushing his glasses further up his nose. 

“I need to talk to you. I'm worried about Virgil,” Patton told him, a faint frown creasing on his forehead. It only deepened as he glanced around the room and Logan wished he had known that Patton had planned on visiting him today. He would have forced himself to expend some of his dwindling energy and made sure his room was tidy. As it was, he had sacrificed his usual neat and tidy ethics to conserve his energy, letting his night clothes remain on his bed, which had not been neatly made. Books were half pulled out on the bookcase and not all carefully pushed back to create one straight, unbroken line. The place looked a shambles. 

Still, at least the words were useful, their meaning slowly sinking into his tired brain. Ah, good. It seemed as though he wasn’t the only one who had noticed the change in Virgil and wished to act accordingly. Perhaps together they would be able to solve it, Logan through facts and Patton through... emotion. Or something. 

“And you,” Patton added after a short pause. 

Wait. What?

Logan thought he had been quite convincing in his attempts to act as though nothing was wrong. He hadn't come out of his room, hadn’t shown himself to Thomas or anything like that. He had been working on solving the problem, whatever it might be, without dragging the rest into his mess. They shouldn’t have noticed from an absence that something was wrong, certainly not enough for Patton to actually confront him about it. Logan frowned, staring at Patton in which he begrudgingly had to admit was confusion. Why was Patton concerned about him? 

“I assure you Patton, there is no need to be wasting your time with myself, I am operating at... adequate capacity.” 

Logan had been unaware that Patton was capable of giving the sort of look he was now receiving, one that was a mixture of annoyance, anger and... something else as he sighed and lifted a hand to play with the sleeves of the cardigan tied around his neck.

“What’s wrong with my cooking?”

“I - pardon?”

“What is wrong with my cooking?” Patton repeated, a flicker of... that same something crossing his face from before. Like before, the emotion had appeared and vanished too quickly for Logan to be able to recognize it and place it within the list of ones he had defined. He couldn’t understand what cooking had to do with this apparent worry Patton had for him, the sudden shift in conversation bewildering. 

One would have thought that spending his whole existence living with Patton would have prepared him for such an occurrence but no matter how often it happened, he found himself as left behind as the first time. Why they could never simply have one conversation topic at a time and completely conclude their business on that topic before moving on to another was beyond Logan. His lack of an answer seemed to simply spur Patton on, the moral side taking a step closer and carefully shutting the door behind him. 

“You never outwardly had any complaints about it before and I thought you liked what I made. Then something changed and I can’t work out what, and you always say that the best way to solve problems is to ask questions. So Logan, I ask again. What is wrong with my cooking?” 

“Nothing is wrong with your cooking Patton,” he assured him, very faint alarm bells going off in his mind. Why had he worded it like that? It was the truth, Patton’s cooking was perfectly adequate and he would go so far as to say that there were certain meals that were indeed delicious. So why hadn’t he just said that in order to get Patton out of the room before he noticed something was making Logan behave... unlike himself. Why had he answered the question in such a peculiar fashion? 

Repetition. He had read something once about that, after Deceit had first shown himself and Logan had spent days researching everything he could about lying and lies in general. He had many facts already at his fingertips but he needed more. Logan always needed more. He needed to be prepared in case Deceit tried to trick them again. No, not if. When Deceit tried to trick them again. Which meant learning all the tells of lying. Repetition of the original question as a way to answer was one of them. 

That had to be a coincidence surely. 

It was hard for him to focus, he couldn’t think , couldn’t work out why Patton was bringing up this topic now of all moments. There had been nothing to trigger such a reaction surely. Logan had been leaving the empty plates outside his door instead of in the kitchen, another sign of his lack of energy. Not that he was willing to think too hard on that. No, He just hadn’t wanted to worry the moral side with his difficulties, hadn’t wanted him to see the state that he was in. That was all. Logan hadn’t wanted to run the risk of looking ill in front of the others. 

Not to mention, the empty plates surely signified that rather than having a problem with his cooking as Patton had somehow decided, that Logan actually was fond of the food because he was eating it completely and leaving no waste behind. Patton should see the plates and be happy, not this strange mix of sad and worried. He wasn’t eating them. That surely was deceitful. Logan repressed the shiver that wanted to run through him at the thought, and the last thing he wanted, was to be like a dark side.

“I'm not stupid Logan,” Patton said firmly, statement hanging heavily in the air between them. It was as though a switch had been flicked, suddenly electrifying the air around them, static making the breath catch in his throat. 

“I never said you were,” Logan protested, his eyes widening in shock. Out of every possible direction he had calculated that this conversation might go after that first wild twist, this was not one of them. Where had it even come from? How could Logan’s views on his cooking, whatever he might think they be versus the reality of Patton’s excellent skills be a deciding factor as to if Logan thought Patton was of below average intelligence. He was needlessly silly and there were plenty of times when Logan found himself hoping and wishing that Patton would just be serious and sensible for once in his life but that didn’t mean he believed he was mentally impaired - did it? 

“No, but you think it all the time. Like I said, I'm not stupid Logan, I know what you think of me more often than not, I know you don't understand the value I bring to Thomas’ overall well being.” 

There was a hint of bitterness to Patton’'s voice and that - that was something that he had never heard before. He would rather go back to the worry or even the questions as to his cooking skills rather than face what he was facing right now. Logan was really starting to suspect he was not going to like this conversation and where it ended up going. Any control he had over this conversation had figuratively flown out the window long ago. 

“I appreciate your value! You are important to Thomas, I fully accept that. You are... important to us all.” Logan was not any good at this, at finding the correct words to comfort someone. That, ironically enough, for Patton’s department and yet here they were, with Logan trying to figure out what he was supposed to say to create the desired outcome. He did not like the idea of Patton being upset with him or believing that his worth was anything less than it was. 

“Maybe so, but you don't _understand_ Logan. And that...” Patton trailed off, giving a heavy sigh and shaking his head. He took yet another step closer, his legs brushing against the side of the desk Logan was still half slumped against, staring at him, all playful expressions wiped clear away. 

“That is part of the problem.”

It was as though Patton had tossed a bucket of below freezing water over him with those words, the logical side freezing in place to stare up at him. Logan might not have had any feelings to hurt but if Patton had been trying to cause him mental discomfort he had more than succeed with those words. They could not have been designed better to damage him. 

“My lack of understanding is the problem as to my well being? My views on your cooking or your intelligence?” Logan snapped, his hand clenching tightly around air. He wished he still had his pen in his hand, although it would have just given him something to throw. At least he would have been holding something though, instead of feeling his fingernails dig into the flesh of his palm. 

“No! The problem is you don’t understand, that you don’t understand.”

Now this was starting to make his head hurt. 

“You are correct. I don’t understand, I am afraid you have lost me,” Logan replied stiffly and he just wanted this to end by this point. Whatever it was that Patton was trying to tell him, it was far too... convoluted for Logan to be able to pierce the darkness around them. Usually that was part of his job, but again, it seemed as though he was failing even at that. 

“You don’t understand but instead of accepting that, you have to try and understand but you use the wrong tools and you refuse to even entertain the idea that there may be a better way than the one you have decided upon.” There was a fierceness to Patton’s voice, an intensity, a passion almost that Logan wasn’t used to hearing from him. He truly seemed fired up about his thoughts this time. “All you have to do is accept that I’m important without needing to define it.”

“But without definition, how can there be true comprehension? You are important to Thomas, I have never stated otherwise, but there is no harm surely in clarifying exactly how you help?”

“You know how I help! I’m _Morality,_ Logan! I am right and wrong, happiness and disaster. I keep Thomas functioning just as well as you do, but in different ways. And that’s okay... I just wish you could accept that it was okay. Not everything is a puzzle that has to be solved.”

“What else is the point of a puzzle?” Logan replied, feeling as though he was still missing... well, an important piece of this puzzle, so to speak. 

“You just need to accept I am what I am, and what I am needs no excuses... and if I was Roman, I would be singing right about now, so be thankful for that one?” Patton tried to smile as he spoke, an upward twist of lips that looked more painful than anything else, a momentary lift before he sighed, letting the fake happiness fade. “You know what? It’s like you say. Focus on one issue at a time. Once we solve one problem, it will hopefully move onto the next and things will be easier. And then the next and the next. So, what is wrong with my cooking?”

Back to this again. That was not the most important issue at all. Logan didn’t want to think about cooking or food, not when Patton had dropped the huge bombshell that he didn’t understand and that this lack of understanding was the main problem. What didn’t he understand? What, what, what? He needed to understand. Even if it was just exactly what was the lack of understanding was about. 

That was the problem wasn’t it. At least as far as Patton was concerned. This ever shifting problem was that... what exactly. That Logan is not meant to forever question and define the world around them? He seemed to think that you didn’t always need to know things.

Logan was Logic. He was meant to know things and to constantly solve the puzzles of the world. And Patton was a puzzle. Just like Roman and Virgil. They were all fascinating aspects that made up the whole that was the complicated personality of Thomas. He wanted to study them of course, he wanted to understand them and why was that so wrong? What was... wrong, about his methods? He had no sought to cause any sort of harm.

He had never meant to truly insult Patton. At least... not recently. Not since he had perhaps realised for the first time how truly important the other side was. Not the most important but still a valuable cog in the machine of Thomas. He needed Patton to be his best, for Thomas’ sake. For all their sakes, because Patton kept them going, just as surely as Logan did. It was why he needed to understand, needed to push through and come to terms with it all. He needed to know. 

Beside him, Patton gave a soft sigh, Logan blinking back to reality with a start. How long had he been turning over his own thoughts in his mind and dreading to follow where they might lead?

“Just answer the question Logan.”

“Nothing is wrong with your cooking,” Logan repeated duly, aware that he had fallen back into his previous speech pattern of repetition and all the negative connotations that came with it. The look Patton gave him, was, if possible, even more tired than before, more than matching the inflection of Logan’s voice. 

“Then why are you clicking my food out of existence? Did you think I wouldn't notice? I could feel every time you did it.”

He _knew_. 

Logan could feel what little colour there was still in his face drain away at that knowledge and he had never wanted to cause that sort of discomfort to Patton. Regardless of the actual value of the food itself, he appreciated the effort that Patton put into it. Home cooked meals were important to Patton, another thing that he had never truly gotten but he hadn't wanted to cause him pain by showing his ignorance. 

It seemed as though his wants had been like his thoughts recently. Good in theory, good even in intent and execution but terrible in consequences. No matter how badly he wanted to avoid harm by removing the food in what he had thought would be a quiet, unseen way, he had simply managed to make things worse. Because Patton knew and had always known it seemed.

His intentions had been good. What was that old proverb? 

The road to hell was paved with good intentions. 

Proverb. Noun. A short, well-know pithy saying, stating a general truth or piece of advice. 

Logan stood up rapidly, suddenly needing to get away. From everything. From Patton and his questions, from his own thoughts that were screaming at him, from the weakness that had invaded every cell of his body. It was all suddenly far too much for him to deal with, as though his mind was suddenly unable to cope with the weight it had been holding all this time. His room felt far too stuffy suddenly, tie wrapped tight around his neck in what was no longer comfortable but was instead a noose, cutting off his air supply. He needed to get up, he needed to get away. 

The world spun and dipped alarmingly, as though Logan was on some amusement ride against his will and they were plunging deep into the most active part of the event. Blackness invaded his vision with the sudden shift and spin of the world, the room and Patton vanishing. 

It came back a few seconds later, Logan blinking slowly as he struggled to understand what had just happened. And why his room looked different. He was staring at it from a strange angle, no longer seated or even standing as he had intended to. He was lying down instead... and, Logan realised with a start, there were warm arms around him, his head cushioned by someone’s lap.

Patton had caught him. After their whole fight, after everything that Patton thought and everything they had both done and said, Patton had not even hesitated to dive forward in order to catch him and stop his fall. And now he was simply sat there, letting Logan lie in his lap and was that... was that the feel of fingers combing lightly through his hair? 

“Pat...?” Logan whispered, voice suddenly weak and painful. It hurt to move but he forced himself all the same, shifting just a fraction so he could tilt his head to look up. He had been correct in his deductions, partly at least. He was in Patton’s lap and that was indeed Patton’s fingers sweeping through his hair. He wasn’t sure exactly what trickery Patton was using, but whatever it was actually doing, it was working wonders for the headache that had been plaguing him for so long, each brush just unknotting a fraction more of that pain and letting it all drain away. Some part of Logan wanted to just lie here forever and ignore everything he was meant to be. 

“Logan?” Patton asked, his worry seeping through. Really, it was amazing, Logan thought, that Patton was able to do anything, to function as he did, when he was always caught in the grip of some emotion or other, always worried or worked up or angry or happy. It had to be exhausting and he knew he would been unable to handle it. A good thing, therefore, that it wasn’t his area. Logan prefered it when Patton was ‘happy’. There were many words for happy, many ways in which to describe a positive state, contented, cheerful, merry, joyful, troubled, delighted, glowing, gratified, radiant, blessed and so on. 

In its most simplest form however, happy was... good. 

It made Thomas function better. It made Morality function better and Logan was always one for something that improved their overall functional ability. It was also a desirable state in its own right, and Logan found great satisfaction in knowing that Patton was content. He found even greater satisfaction in thinking he was the cause of such contentment. Now he had to face the fact that Patton was the opposite of happy and had still come to him, had still offered him help without expecting anything in return. 

Logan blinked again, his eyelids feeling heavy and unwieldy. They had felt bad before but that was nothing, he was quickly coming to realise, to how they felt now, and each drop and lift of eyelids felt like agony, a struggle. It would be much easier to simply keep them shut, and drift in the warmth of Patton. Despite the pain in his eyes and the rising panic that was still swirling around inside of him, there was something almost... comforting about this moment. As though he could just let his eyes close and drift away, and he would be safe, because Da- because Patton was here. 

Which was ridiculous. Of course he was safe. He was in Thomas’ mind, there was nothing that could possibly harm him. So why did he feel as though he was safer, with the other side? Why did he feel as though Patton could somehow protect him from everything, including the thoughts that were betraying him? For some ill defined reason, it felt as though no matter what the problem was or how to beat it, the other side would be more than capable of holding his own and defending him. Saving him. 

It was as though his Dad was with him and who could possibly be afraid - not that Logan ever felt afraid - when your dad was nearby? 

Patton leaned over Logan, shaking him from those strange thoughts. The moral sides glasses were sliding down his nose slightly as he stared at the other side, worry mingling clearly with fear. It struck Logan that he had seen many emotions from Patton, but he wasn’t sure he had ever seen such naked fear before. 

“What's wrong?”

It was impossible to ignore the truth any longer, to deny the thoughts that were leaping through his mind like a posse of Wallabies, throwing up dirt and mess in their wake. He had come up with possibility after possibility, had spun idea after idea like gossamer thread in his life in a frantic attempt to block out the reality of what was actually happening. None of them were correct though, evidence mounting against them until he had been forced to discard them and discover some new answer - excuse - as to the plague that was ravaging him. Now though, he was out of possibilities. Or rather, he was down the the wire, with only one option left. One he disliked most of all but he was still Logic. He still followed the trail wherever it might lead, even to somewhere unpleasant as it had done for him. 

Those three little words bubbled up inside of him. Three little words that he hated to even think, let alone say. They were - if it were possible - even worse than admitting to being wrong. The sickness that rose up in him had nothing to do the churning in his stomach now and everything to do with words he forced out through numb lips.

“I don't know.”


	3. How to save a life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we have made it! Once again, sorry for the delay between chapters, this has been a challenge to write but one I have thoroughly enjoyed. We finally reached the end of this story. Thank you so much to everyone who has read this, left kudos or comments, you guys really kept me going when I was hitting a wall with this. 
> 
> Also, please, please, please check out **Listenerofshadows’** work, her stories are so good and well worth a read. 
> 
> Story title, chapter titles and snippet at the start of the story are all from _How to Save a Life_ by **The Fray**. All dictionary definitions are taken from google.
> 
> Set post _Why do we get out of bed in the morning._

** **

### How to save a life

** **

_He will do one of two things_  
_He will admit to everything  
_ _Or he'll say he's just not the same  
_ _And you'll begin to wonder why you came_

_~ How to Save a Life - The Fray_

He woke with a start, sweat on his forehead, a strange weight against his chest. For a moment Logan couldn’t remember where he was, the room unfamiliar in his blurry, still sleep filled sight. Memory remained out of reach, Logan groping helplessly for it and feeling his panic rise in his throat when the past refused to reveal itself. What had happened last night? Where was he? He had to move, had to get out of here but that required more strength than he seemed to possess at the moment, Logan groggily lifting a hand to push at the heat that was covering him, something large, warm and... alive?

The weight on his chest made a soft noise and shifted slightly, his brown eyes dipping down to actually take in what was lying on top of him.

Patton. 

Oh. The moral side made another soft little noise, shifting a little in sleep to get himself more comfortable, his head against Logan’s chest. The warmth that rushed through him had to be because of his sickness, whatever it might be. That was why he felt this strange little twist and dip in his chest. There could be no other reason for it. 

Logan needed to focus, to piece together bit by bit what was going on. First things first, make a list, work out exactly where he was, with Patton and from there, he could start to work backwards, to the ‘how’ and the ‘why’. 

He was in Patton’s bed, the other side hugging him in his sleep. 

Right, good. That was progress. Patton was undeniably adorable in this moment, from a purely objective point of view of course. It was a little distracting as well, if he was going to be honest and since he was only thinking internally, he might as well be. Really, he had no right being this sweet and kind, even after that terrible, awkward argument they had partaken of the night before. The argument. 

Memories of the previous night finally came into sharp relief in his mind, the argument, collapsing against the moral side, the emotions that had swirled up in - in Patton, always in Patton. That was one of his purposes, to be a conduit through which Thomas could explore his own... feelings. He remembered Patton had been very emotional, so much so that perhaps even Logan had felt the tiniest little twinge in sympathy for him. Despite his emotional distress, Patton had still been very useful after Logan had collapsed, springing into action once he had begrudgingly admitted he was unsure as to the cause of his predicament. 

Patton had brought them both here, settled Logan on the bed and dimmed the light. He had gotten into bed beside him and had... and had... dear god, he had rocked him to sleep, singing some scientific prattle song under his breath.

A faint blush coloured his cheeks, the humiliation of how weak he had been burning in his mind. How could he have been so foolish as to have shown Patton his pathetic problems? It would only worry him further and that was the last thing that Logan wanted. Not only that, but he had accepted all the comfort offered as though... as though he had truly wanted and more than that, needed it. He was logic. He didn’t need anything like that. 

Something stirred in the back of his mind, a whisper that he couldn’t quite ignore, a hiss that his lies were really starting to build up now and he needed to take better care of himself. Needed to be careful because he was this close to ruining everything.

Maybe, just maybe then, he did enjoy the very rare occasions in which he allowed Patton to be the Dad that he so badly wanted to be. Not that he needed it a lot of the time, but on the occasions when he did, it was... satisfactory to let Patton take care of him. It didn’t make him feel anything, but it made Patton happy which was only to be desired. And other things. Logan gave a huff of frustration at his own thoughts. They were aiding nobody. It was time to actually start doing something.

Carefully, he began to ease himself out from under Patton, holding his breath and freezing everytime the other side shifted in his sleep. Thankfully, Patton had always been a heavy sleeper, only waking up when his alarm went off to signify it was time to start making breakfast. It was early still, too early for anyone to be awake, Logan finally slipping out of a hold that had become progressively more octopus like as his escape attempt went on. 

Glasses were rather roughly pushed back onto his face as he climbed to his feet, the world finally coming back into sharp focus. It had been child’s play to be able to tell the two pairs apart despite being half blind without them. There was a feel to his own, a clean, comforting weight that he had been able to recognize. Plus there was not a single fingerprint smudge on his lenses, unlike the more messy pair that Patton had. 

Speaking of Patton, he sighed again, hand absently reaching out to pat at the now empty bed. Even in sleep, he was searching for Logan, trying in his own way to help. Logan only wished that his problems were as simple and as easily solved as with a hug and some time with someone else. 

His stomach churned unpleasantly, tying itself some into yet more knots. At this point he couldn’t even tell if it was due to the strange sickness that was still affecting him or the fact that he had shown such weakness in front of anyone else. When Patton woke up, he would surely have questions again, questions that he would naturally look at Logan to answer. And Logan - Logan didn’t have any to give him. Which meant he couldn’t stay here and wait for Patton to wake up, he had to try and find something tangible to show him. Logan was no closer to squaring his own personal circle than the last time he had woken up or the time before that. 

It was far past time to be getting some answers. 

He sighed softly, hand running rather uselessly through his hair in a pointless attempt to try and calm it down before slipping silently from Patton’s room and heading down the hallway. 

Really, he wanted to go back to his room and find his hairbrush, wanted to snap himself into a clean set of clothes and make himself presentable. It was his... armour, to use a term that Roman of all people might be familiar with. His way of coping with the rest of the world so to speak. Armour was one of those strange words, that not only had multiple meanings, but the very type of word they were changed depending on the definition itself. 

As a noun, it did not work with his thoughts and he would have considered it rather foolish to use when the defination was co clear as to only cover the metal used to cover people or vehicles in case of battle. As a verb however... 

Armour. Verb. Provide (someone) with emotional, social, or other defenses. 

That certainly seemed about right. His tie and neat appearance gave him social defenses against the uncontrolled chaos that was pure creativity. None of the others seemed to realise how hard it could be at times, to be logical against the rising tide that was emotional imagination. Or emotional anxiety or even just emotions in general. It was hard at times, to be the sole voice of reason in a world that felt as though it had gone mad. It was hard, but wasn’t that, in a way, the point? He was logic, he was meant to be the one person fighting the good fight. No matter how exhausting it could be at times.

That was fine though. That was his job. To handle that and to keep Thomas from getting too overwhelmed. Patton felt things and Logan kept them from feeling too much so that it distracted them from the truly important things in life. 

He felt exhausted now, all the way down to his bones. The limited good his night with Patton had done was rapidly fading. The warmth had gone as rapidly as that feeling that he might be better. It is tempting to just turn around and return to the bed, to crawl back beside Patton and let him take the pain away again. It is a temporary solution at best, one that would hurt him more in the long run. This is what he needs to do, this is his job, his purpose. 

Logan solves puzzles. Deduces problems. Comes up with solutions. He might not be able to answer his own issues but then it wasn’t only Logan who was suffering. He was not the only one Patton was concerned about. There was Virgil too and if he cannot solve his own problems he can certainly solve that. He has a plan and steps and stages and it is all perfectly doable. 

Step one. Talk to Roman. It is still obscenely early but that will actually aid him as Roman will hopefully be too groggy to be able to distract him or run off on some tangent. If he is the luckiest side in the head, he might even get some short and to the point answers, be in and out before Roman properly woke up and realised what was happening. 

A plan and something to follow always helped Logan, another piece of metaphorical armour for him to place around himself. It gives him the push he needs to stop in front of Roman’s door and actually knock, a series of sharp, precise little sounds that were easily identifiable as belonging to Logan.

There was a long silence. Some time was only to be expected, considering the hour, but he wasn’t sure how long to wait before knocking again, Logan resisting the temptation to shift from foot to foot. Such behaviour would only create the wrong impression when the creative side eventually answered his knock. If he ever answered the knock. Logan was just considering finally knocking again when the door began to open, Roman standing on the other side, one hand against his mouth to try and cover the huge yawn that threatened to escape. He didn’t exactly look the perfect prince he tried so hard to be, hair sticking up all over the place, his pyjamas rumpled. He looked, in fact, as though he had just rolled out of his bed. 

Which of course, he probably just had. 

“Roman.”

“Specs. I think we need to talk,” Roman replied, leaning against his door frame and yawning again. He looked about two seconds from just falling back asleep and Logan half suspected the attempt at a casual pose was less for the dramatic look and more to keep himself from having to stand upright when he looked that tired. “I mean this isn’t the time I would have picked, but whatever.” 

“Indeed we do,” Logan agreed. It was a little too soon to be getting his hopes up perhaps, but it certainly seemed as though this conversation could go more smoother than the last one he had. It would have been hard for it to go any worse after all. At least Roman understood there was a conversation to be had. Perhaps he even accepted his own complicitness in whatever was ailing Virgil. There was a long, awkward pause, both sides staring at each other, both waiting for the other to take the lead.

“Well... you knocked. You go first.” Roman said as the long moment continued to stretch on and on, a potential infinity in the span of these seconds, as though the whole of eternity could occur in this one breath that never ended. 

Logan gave a stiff little nod at that, swallowing down the urge to play with his tie once more. It would give away his discomfort too much, just as the foot motions would have done. Roman wasn’t ignorant and while he might be the most easily distracted of the four, he wasn’t blind. He would pick up on social cues and physical behaviour, just as well as the others. Better, perhaps, since he was the acting side of Thomas. He knew all about how to move your body, how to inhabit a different personality, a different mindset. He understood body language like no other. Logan had to cut to the chase, to end this conversation as quickly as he could, the logical side deciding to forgo any useless pleasantries and simply ask what he had come here to ask.

“What happened between Virgil and yourself?”

“I... that’s what you want to talk about?” Roman looked more taken aback by this than he really has any right to be, Logan frowning a little at the reaction. He had thought they were on the same figurative page, so to speak, he had thought Roman understood why they were here. Only something genuinely important would have driven Logan to knock on his door at such an early hour and what would be more important at this time than solving Virgil's issues? He had believed that Roman thought that too. 

It seemed as though he had been incorrect yet again - his examples of being incorrect were rapidly rising, this strange few days of illness were going to completely skewer the data set as to his reliability and make them utterly worthless. The date, not himself. It did not make himself worthless. He wasn’t worthless.

“Of course. What else could there be to talk about Roman? Virgil is clearly suffering and he started this strange behaviour directly following on from his argument with you.”

That... was not completely right though was it? Virgil had spoken to Logan after Roman. He hadn’t forgotten about it exactly, he remembered the conversation vividly, it was what had convinced him that Roman would know something of great importance. He just hadn’t realised exactly what it was. In a way, this was all his fault. Logan had been the one to suggest this potential course of action, albeit indirectly. Whatever Virgil was doing in order to prove to Roman that he was wrong about... something, was creating this side effect where he was unable to sleep. Who knew how far outside of his comfort zone Virgil had pushed himself, all to try and save his friend. It was exactly the sort of move he would do.

“That is not because of me Logan,” Roman replied, a somewhat pointed tone to his voice. Almost as though the creative side thought they were having a completely different conversation than the one they actually were. Logan _hated_ it when he was in a conversation and the people were talking at cross purposes, it made everything so unnecessarily complicated. 

“Then why is he not sleeping?” Logan asked after a beat, trying to pull the conversation back to his side of the road. Even blame was unimportant compared to discovering the cause. There was nothing for Roman to be ashamed of, nothing to feel guilty about. In the end, Virgil had made his own choices, just as they all did. True, his choices were almost always dictated by others, by that burning desire he had to keep them safe from anything, even themselves. Logan had long since suspect that even more than anxiety, their more nervous friend represented that protective desire that could burn so strongly in Thomas. 

Protect. Verb.

1\. Keep safe from harm of injury.

2\. Aim to preserve (a threatened species or area) by legislating against collecting, hunting or development.

3\. (of an insurance policy) promise to pay (someone) an agreed amount in the event of loss, injury, fire, theft, or other misfortune. 

The first definition could have been written to describe Virgil in particular. So much of his life revolved around that, but it was his choice. His informed choice and Logan needed to gain that same level of knowledge if he was going to pull him out of whatever dark corner he had managed to get himself into. 

“Our argument was nothing to do with sleep, believe me brainiac I have no idea why he isn’t sleeping. If anything, _you_ should know.”

“What was it about then? And why should I know what is going on within Virgil’s mind?” 

Logan could feel his frustration start to sharply rise the longer this conversation went on, internally going through the breathing exercises Virgil had once told him about. It had meant a lot, for Virgil to trust him enough to teach him how to help calm him down in case he got stuck in a panic attack and couldn’t remember how to do it himself. Apparently that was quite common during a severe panic, as it was one of the reasons in which an attack would escalate beyond expected levels. 

The brain itself would betray you, would turn on you in not only the lies it whispered but also by removing any defenses you might have against it. Truly a vicious state of affairs. His own brain had been betraying him. In a slower, less marked way of course, and it was not anxiety he was stricken with, but perhaps once he had helped Virgil regain a sense of equilibrium, the anxious side would be able to do the same for him. If he wasn’t too agitated and could talk sense of course, which was not always a guarantee with Virgil. The aftermath of an attack could be as debilitating as the attack itself. 

After that conversation, Logan had locked himself in his room for almost a full day, researching everything on the internet he could find about the symptoms, causes and treatments for anxiety. He always did enjoy learning. More than that though, he truly wanted to be able to help Virgil when the situation presented itself. And rather sadly, he was well aware that it would happen again, more than once. It was unfair, as so many things in life were and while he could not prevent the attacks from occurring, at least he could be on hand to offer an objective and thus hopefully desirable voice of reason and pull him back from the brink. Virgil trusted him enough to tell him his own weaknesses, no matter how obvious they might actually be. 

That was all beside the point and besides the current conversation he was rather painfully attempting to have. Roman was making absolutely no sense, as usual. Logan can’t remember why he thought this would be a good use of his time, why he thought he would be able to get a decent answer out of him at any time of the day, especially this early. 

He should have gone directly to the source. Admittedly, it was always dangerous to confront Virgil about an issue he might be suffering from without first getting all the correct facts in order, but at least it would be more productive than this. 

With Virgil being Anxiety and thus more prone to suffering from cognitive distortions, Logan always had to be careful with how he approached problems connected to the most nervous side among them. It was far too easy to say the wrong thing, and for Virgil to overthink it as a result. He has repaired their relationship a number of times - three - so far and he does not relish the idea of having to do it again because of a stray, unintended word that would make his friend think this was some experiment or that Logan was attempting to ‘fix’ him. All he desired to do was aid, and on his good days, Virgil was very well aware of that.

A shame that the problems by their nature, only arose on the bad days. 

At least Virgil was more willing to listen to a logical argument when the case was presented convincingly. He welcomed a sensible progression of events that he could follow. Each step would be argued of course, multiple alternative routes offered at certain points but so long as Logan had prepared his case correctly, they would be disputed and defeated until Virgil was able to see reality as it truly was. 

That was what Logan was meant to be doing. Not this useless verbal fencing with Roman. 

“Look Logan...” Roman seemed frustrated more than anything else, the not so regal looking regal side rubbing at his face with his hand. Logan couldn’t help the slight little flinch as he snapped back to awareness and he had been so caught up in thinking about how best to approach the Virgil problem - not that Virgil is himself a problem to be solved, no matter what his friend’s own mind might spit at him - that he had almost forgotten he was part way through a conversation or argument with Roman.

Lately, it seemed as though they were incapable of having the first without it turning into the second. 

“I wish I knew why he wasn’t sleeping, because it is killing me,” Roman told him, and he couldn’t mistake the sincerity in those words for anything else. Roman truly didn’t know. Which was just another reason why this was now a pointless endeavor which was draining what little energy he had left and he still had to help Virgil. Roman didn’t seem to notice his own fatigue, the creative side still talking. 

“I want to help him, I need to help him and instead I watch him get worse and worse by the day. I want to help you too Logan please, let me-”

“No thank you Roman,” Logan said sharply, cutting him off before he could say anything else, and he most certainly did not require assistance from him. That was a step too far and Logan was only just starting to accept that there was a problem in the first place. He had accepted Patton’s help when it was offered, partly because he had been given no choice and partly because it had been a relief to finally let someone look after him. He wasn’t ready to do it a second time and anyway, he had a mission now, he had something to focus on, something he should be doing instead. 

“I shall keep your most kind offer at the forefront of my mind, but at the moment I do not require any assistance.” 

Logan turned sharply on his heel, intending to march back to the safety of his bedroom, silently dismissing Roman and the rest of this conversion as having no more value when the whole failed purpose had been to gather information on whatever was ailing Virgil. The world shifted as he moved, becoming grey and dim around the edges. It reminded him uncomfortably of the moments before his loss of control in his own room. He was not going to collapse again. He would not give in to such childish,, wanton weakness as that.

Hands curled into fists as he fought to remain upright and in control. A precious thing that had been sadly lacking in his existence recently, torn from his grasp by either current events of his own mind. Behind him, Logan thought he could hear a half intake of breath, as though Roman was about to say something but had changed his mind at the last moment.

Good. 

Logan didn’t think he was capable of coping with any more conversation, not when he could drift away so easily. He needed - he needed... he needed something, he needed peace, quiet, he needed a seat where he could work out... something. His mind felt as foggy as his vision, synapses misfiring as they sparked this way and that, never enough to form a clear and actual answer. Just enough to make him feel as though he was on the cusp of discovering something, clarifying something. If only they would work as intended. 

This conversation needed to end, and really it needed to end a good few sentences ago. There was nothing Logan could do about the past, he was no wizard, and the technology that was required of time travel had theoretically not been invented yet. All he could was leave now, refuse to acknowledge what had almost happened - the key word being almost - and hope that he could salvage some small thing from this. Roman was still quiet, unusually so and what had originally seemed like a lifeline, how felt uncomfortable to him, Logan becoming more and more aware of how odd the situation was. Roman was never quiet for this long.

It was as though he was waiting for something.

Well, if it was to be an admission of guilt, failings or feelings, then he was going to be sadly disappointed. Logan had lingered here too long as it was, and he had already said his goodbyes. There was no need to say anything more, or even look back, Logan forcing himself to move. His legs felt as though they might be made of lead rather than imaginary limbs that should have no weight to them at all. In theory he doesn’t even need to walk to his room. He can just think and be there. That requires effort though, concentration and it is easier to force aching muscles to move along the hallway and into the solitude of his room.

Roman hadn’t even tried to follow after him and Logan should be relieved by that. He should be a lot of things. The fact that he wasn’t trying to be loud and dramatic with him was unimportant compared to what had already happened. The figative cat, out of a figative bag. His jaw clenched, teeth gritted together as Logan tried to ignore the fact that yet another side had seen a moment of weakness. Another example of his own failings. How long would it be before Roman brought this matter to Thomas’ attention? Who knew what Thomas would do upon discovering it. 

Well, Logan had an idea or two. Thomas, being Thomas, would no doubt start by attempting to be understanding. He would draw upon Patton's area of expertise and go through various states of sympathy, empathy. He would seek soothe ruffled feathers and claim that it didn’t really matter, that it wouldn’t change anything. It would change everything. Even Thomas would be forced to concede to that in the long run, that they couldn’t just ignore the issue. Love wouldn’t work, ignorance wouldn’t work. Roman would probably have a whole list of suggestions, some of which would no doubt make his skin crawl.

The whole thing would be painfully humiliating for everyone concerned. Virgil would almost certainly be affected by the ordeal, which would be hardly helpful when he was already struggling. Such an act would only make the anxious side worse and that, in turn, would make Thomas’ behaviour change. They might dance around the topic and discuss it at length, be distracted by some of the effects but eventually, they would trace it all back to the basic fact that Logan was not working as he should. 

No amount of good feelings or hugs would repair him or enable Thomas to work as he should because at the end of the day, what use would Thomas have of a faulty Logic? It was not like Creativity which could change on whim and still function. Creativity was an ever evolving thing, constantly finding new forms which really Logan found bewildering and hard to keep track of at times. Logic was not supposed to be like that. Logic was an ever stable thing in an otherwise uncertain universe. Logic was cold, precise and could be recreated to have the same result every time. It followed rules.

Yet Logan no longer seemed to. 

It didn’t matter. He could focus on his own problems another day. There was more pressing matters to deal with, and solving Virgil’s issues would go part way towards solving his own. Perhaps all he really needed was a little confidence boost that he was still capable of solving problems.

Yes, that would surely be the cure he was looking for. One step in front of the other, and he would be back on track in no time. If he was fortunate, he might even be back to his normal self by the time Roman thought to tell Thomas of the latest issues in his own mind. Renewed purpose was already helping him, giving him energy to stride forward and pull his chair out. Logan sat at his desk and opened one of his many notebooks to a brand new page. 

Writing out his thoughts as they came to him was the best way to filter out the random noise without losing track of what he was actually trying to do. A lot of it would be useless of course, but that was the whole point. He would be able to look back over his notes and start to edit them, down and down and down until he was finally able to pinpoint the issue at hand. Start wide, work in. It was an admirable work ethic. 

Insomnia. Noun. Habitual sleeplessness; inability to sleep. 

Well that certainly seemed to fit Virgil. Logan had long suspected that as the physical manifestation of such a potentially debilitating condition like anxiety, that Virgil would suffer from some of the more unpleasant side effects that it would bring. It had been obvious, even before he had been accepted into the group, that Virgil suffered from anxiety himself as well as representing it. Or perhaps, for Virgil at least, it was the same thing. He was what he was, but then again they were all more than their mere titles proclaimed them to be. Roman, for example, was creativity and romance, the sort of annoying love at first sight, dreamy sighs across a room whenever Thomas thought of his latest crush that always managed to drag him away from anything important. Logan could never win when Roman was in one of those moods, no matter how much it pained him to think.

Virgil... well, Virgil was so much more than what he has first presented to the rest of them. Even now, he was so much more than even, Logan suspected, he himself realised. He was protective in his actions yes, possibly even protection but he was emotion as well. He threw himself in front of bullies and into danger far more often than he should, if it meant keeping anyone else from getting hurt in the process. 

Fight, flight, freeze. Obey. Survive. That was what Virgil wanted, he wanted to keep Thomas alive, keep him healthy. If he was only anxiety, then health wouldn’t matter. It frustrated Logan at times, how willfully blind Virgil was to his own merits. It was more than not seeing, it was not wanting to see, refusing to see. 

Virgil wanted to look after the others as well, which was why, in a grand circle, they were at this impasse in the first place. It had to be why, and now that he had the why, he could lead into the how - not sleeping - and surely after that, it would only be a matter of moments before he discovered the solution.

Pen danced across the page almost of its own accord, Logan letting his mind wander and his hand move as it saw fit, filling line after line with his cramped handwriting. It was almost a release, in its own way, being able to put down some of his thoughts and conclusions about what was going on in the mind, and what could be affecting Virgil. 

Logan lost all track of time as he sat there, oblivious to the creaks and rustles of the constructed landscape as the other sides started to properly stir and move around as they wished. He didn’t notice the imaginary sun peeking in through imaginary windows. Didn’t notice anything in fact until he was forced to. A low little cough had Logan finally looking up from his writing, blinking a couple of times as his tired brain attempted to make sense of the new sight in front of him, eyes struggling to click into focus, to shift from the up close and personal writing he had been doing, to the more long distance sight of someone standing by the entrance to his room, door ajar enough for him to have slipped inside without having to move it. 

Not for the first time, Logan had neglected to close his own door and someone had been able to enter unannounced. At least he lived with civilized people, that still sought ways to draw his attention. Internally, Logan couldn’t help but shudder at the thought of what some of the less desirable elements of Thomas’ mind might have done, had they been able to enter his room with him blissfully unaware. 

After a few seconds the blur of black and purple finally solidified into the familiar form of Virgil, the anxious side watching him patiently. Well, Logan had wanted to talk to him but he didn’t feel ready in the slightest. Eyes flickered back down to the page he had been writing on, suddenly irrationally concerned that Virgil might see what he was writing and grow offended because of it. He need not have worried. While the start of the page was filled with his usual neat handwriting, the further down it got, the more uneven the writing became and the more ridiculous the actual words were. Thoughts on the causes of sleeplessness had degraded into all manner of stupid rambles, thoughts on the mind as a whole, worries about his own situation, concern over Thomas’ behaviour both now and in the future. 

He had anticipated a degree of rambling of course, had known that his thoughts would go off topic because that was how free form thinking worked, putting everything out of the mind and onto the page. The sheer amount of writing that was irreverent to the problem at hand was almost overwhelming. None of this was going to help Virgil, Logan flipping the book shut with a soft and tired exhale, gripping it loosely within his hands. Another dead end, another failed course of action. Another wasted chance and how many of those did he even have left?

“Sup Logan,” Virgil mumbled, voice even rasper than normal, Logan looking back up at his - friend? Was that their relationship? All the dictionary definitions felt woefully inadequate when it came to capturing the connection between the various sides of Thomas’ personality and yet Logan felt duty bound to try once more.

Friend. Noun. A person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations. 

A bond of mutual affection? Affection was feeling and that was something Logan attempted to avoid at all costs. Why could friendship not involve bonds of respect and equal satisfaction? A desire to know that the other was in good health without having to involve emotions. If Data from Star Trek could forge bonds of friendship unhampered by emotion, who was to say that Logan could not? Were they family then? The explanation of friend didn’t really seem to do their relationship justice, and since the first exclusion went without saying, he would have to explore in a little detail, the second.

Family. Noun.

1\. A group consisting of two parents and their children living together as a unit.

2\. All the descendants of a common ancestor. 

They weren’t family either, not by those definitions. Even words themselves were failing him now, or their meanings were at least. The last brick in his support structure, the cornerstone of his whole existence was starting to crumble away. What was he, if he couldn’t even rely on the dictionary to define his words and thus his reality? There was uncertainty as to the meaning of reality and then there was this, this terrible void that wanted to suck him in and spit out what little would remain - if indeed, anything would remain at all. 

Virgil. He should be focusing on Virgil, not mired in something that was sickeningly akin to self pity.

The scratchiness of Virgil’s voice made Logan flinch a little to even hear it, his own throat hurting in apparent sympathy. There was a term for that, but it eluded him, the knowledge hovering just out of reach, as it so often appeared to do lately. Logan gritted his teeth and tried to ignore yet another sign of his mind turning against him. That small boost of productivity which the night with Patton had granted him seemed to have long since vanished, his mind as cold as his limbs, all the warmth leeched clean away.

Pleasantries. Small talk. Normally he would have considered it a waste of time when there was an actual matter to debate but in this situation it seemed as though it would make sense to lead into the topic he truly wanted to discuss. It would grant him a few precious seconds of breathing room, to try and work out just how to ask the questions he needed to.

“Virgil. I am pleased to see you out of your room. I trust you are well?” Trust had nothing to do with it, trust seemed to be in short supply around here at the moment, but that was the sort of greeting you were expected to give. Virgil nodded slightly, hands resting in the pockets of his hoodie. 

“Yeah, I just had a nice little chat with Roman.”

Internally, Logan pushed down the sigh that wanted to slip free and really, did Roman have nothing better to do than interfere? Who knew what he had actually told Virgil, how he had misconstrued events. He had thought that at worse, Roman would go and speak to Thomas, would try and cause drama there, would create all manner of pain and disarray without stopping to consider that Logan would of course approach Thomas himself, when there was a real need to do so. He should have realised that he would predict Logan making such a prediction and change his plans accordingly. Roman’s strength lay in his creativity, as that was his purpose after all. Logan’s strength was supposed to rest in the fact that he was aware of that and would be able to counter such effects. 

“I assure you, I was not attempting to engage him in any sort of fight, nor did I desire any kind of negative outcome.” 

“Never said you did,” Virgil replied easily and there was something... strange about this conversation. Perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise, for all his recent conversations to be odd and this one to simply follow on with that pattern but he had hoped for better from the anxious side. Instead, Logan felt awkwardly as though he was on the wrong foot once more, just waiting for the curtains to lift and show him the reason behind these strange words. 

“You busy solving stuff?” Virgil asked after a short pause, head bobbing towards the closed notebook still held within his hands. Logan looked down, as though he was seeing the object for the first time. He hadn’t expected Virgil to question him so directly on the matter, his mind going blank as he scrambled to think of something to say that wouldn’t be a lie and yet at the same time not reveal all the cards in his hand. Nothing came to mind though, no smart answer helpfully appeared in his mind. He couldn’t think of a half truth and Virgil was still looking at him, waiting for some answer. 

“I... I was attempting to discern what was the root cause for your recent apparent insomnia,” Logan admitted, the words feeling heavy on his tongue. He wasn’t ready for this conversation but after saying that, there was nothing else he could do but have it. If he ended it now, Virgil would no doubt never allow the issue to come up again and then who knew what would happen.

Was it Logan’s imagination or did Virgil actually roll his eyes at the admission? Logan couldn’t help but feel a small little spurt of heat, of annoyance at the idea that Virgil might be frustrated with him. He was trying to help, he was doing his best and the least Virgil could do was understand that. 

“Really? You can’t figure it out?” A faint smile curled onto Virgil’s lips as he spoke but even Logan, as inept as he was in the language of emotions was able to pick up on the simple fact that the smile was not one that contained any warmth or humour. It was not, to put it simply, a ‘good’ smile, Logan suppressing the instinctive reaction to recoil a little from it. That would not help. This conversation wasn’t helping, it was as though Virgil had taken lessons from Roman in how to be vague. 

“If I knew the answer, I would hardly be sitting here trying to gain the information from you, now would I?”

Virgil gave a heavy sigh, looking as though the weight of the world was on his shoulders once more.

“I’m a construct of Thomas’ mind Logan. I’m not real, so therefore I don’t need to sleep. There is no useful purpose to wasting a third of my day unconscious and thus depriving myself and Thomas of valuable time I could spend doing my job,” Virgil told him, each word spoken in an even tone, devoid of almost all emotion or expression, as though he was reciting something off a wall rather than explaining what was going on. 

Logan stared at him, open mouthed. He was well aware that he looked absurd in this moment but how he was viewed did not seem important compared to the words that were pounding through his mind, the meaning that wanted to express itself and Logan didn’t want to hear this, didn’t want to realise what some part of him had already done, the subconscious aspect of his thought process that made his heart speed up, mouth growing even drier. There was something here, something looming overhead and it was going to hurt. 

The anxious side was no longer smiling. He stretched out his arms, eyes still fixed directly on Logan’s, boring into the logical sides own. The gaze made him feel almost dizzy, as though countless galaxies were swirling within those brown orbs, an eternity stretching out this moment and Logan couldn’t look away, no matter how badly he wanted to. 

“Sound familiar?” Virgil challenged, taking a slow step towards him, crowding him almost. 

Oh.

It was as though the proverbial penny had dropped, in a most unpleasant fashion, Logan swallowing heavily as the realisation slammed into him, as he finally understood with dreadful clarity what Virgil was actually saying and what that meant for them both. Logan was not real and thus did not need food... Virgil was not real and thus did not need sleep... except he cleary did. Which meant... which had to mean...

“That... that is not the same thing,” he stammered at last, when his voice decided to return to him. Virgil lifted an eyebrow, his expression lacking any amusement, still standing directly in front of him, arms wide. Logan couldn’t decide if he was trying to ask for a hug or if he was merely being dramatic for the sake of proving his point. 

“Isn't it?” The words were simple enough, but they felt like a red cape against the sudden bull that was twisting and snarling inside of his mind. Logan had to explain, had to prove because it wasn’t the same thing, it couldn’t be the same thing. His symptoms were completely different and if it was the same thing then that meant he had been... no, Logan refused to even think the word, let alone say it. He had to refute this theory Virgil was floating, had to redeem himself from the strange painful churning that was blossoming in his chest at the idea that he might have been the unintended instigator of such damaging behaviour. This couldn’t be his fault. 

“But I feel nausea at the thought of food, I am hardly likely to be suffering from a physical lack of it, if my body then rejects the notion of food. There is something else at play here.” 

“A lack of food will make you not want to eat L,” Virgil replied with a shake of his head, voice still raspy but somehow soft at the same time. If it had been anyone else, he would have thought there was pity in that voice, but Logan knew enough of him to know that Virgil would never be that cruel. He knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of pity and how much they all hated it. It was more... trying to keep them calm? To wave away the bull and the anger, Logan feeling that flash of fury drain away almost as suddenly as it had first appeared, Virgil looking away and breaking the eye contact at the same time. 

“The body is trying to defend itself, its eating what you have stored and with all the stomach acid rising up... come on man, you know all this yourself. I don’t need to tell you, you just have to listen to what your body is really saying.”

“Bodies cannot talk,” Logan replied, almost without thinking and it was in his nature to constantly seek clarity, to make sure that everyone knew exactly what they were saying, at all times. 

Virgil breathed out, a soft little huff that even Logan could tell was of growing frustration and he supposed it was only the tiredness and the lack of energy that the other side had to be feeling that stopped him from showing more physical examples of his annoyance. Arms dropped down to his side, Virgil closing his eyes for a moment before he carried on.

“Not verbally, but we both know there are other ways to convey thoughts and outcomes. Look at me. Look at what has happened because I decided to forgo sleeping for several days. If I need something as basic, as... human as sleep, then your original reasoning was lacking important information that you needed.” 

Lacking information. Not flawed, not wrong and Logan cannot help but be pathetically grateful that Virgil had decided to word it in that fashion.

“You need to eat just as much as I need to sleep and I'd really like to sleep so please, will you just start eating again already?” 

“I...” Logan trailed off, all the many perfectly reasonable explanations as to why Virgil was wrong and he was right falling away in his mind. None of them made any sense now, not faced with this newest information and he finally realised... he had been wrong. He. Had. Been. Wrong. 

This had all been _his_ fault. Well. That was... unpleasant to know. 

There was no reason for guilt, Logan reminded himself. Virgil was a grown side, capable of making his own informed choices and dealing with his own consequences. Virgil had decided to do this himself, without any pushing or guilt from anyone else. Virgil had made this choice all by himself.

Virgil had made this choice because he loved Logan and he had wanted to show him the true outcome of his actions. Virgil had ripped himself apart because he had known, even then, that it would be the only way Logan would notice - and he had been right. Logan had easily forgotten about his own issues and focused on what he had thought really mattered, on Virgil alone. He had been able to see things he hadn’t noticed in his own behaviour because it had easier to focus when someone important to him had been in pain. 

He had even told Logan directly what he was doing and why. At the time, Logan had simply believed there was another, unseen layer to the words, that despite Virgil asking if this was the only way to convince him, he had meant Roman but it hadn't been as complicated as that at all. Virgil hadn’t wanted to this and had tried to tell him that, but even then Logan had been too caught up the loop of incorrect thoughts, the cognitive distortions sinking deep into his brain and refusing to let go. 

As... illogical as it might be, Logan could not help but feel guilt. Over his own actions and the choices Virgil had made because of them. He had caused Virgil harm by his foolish thinking and how could he have been so stupid? He was logic, he was meant to be better than all of this, and yet he had managed to fall prey to the same kind of wrong thinking that affected Thomas and Virgil. Perhaps, despite his current issues being related to the lack of food, he was still a fault logic, still harmful to his host in general. 

“Don’t,” Virgil cautioned, as though he suddenly had an insight into every thought that was now racing through his mind. “What’s done is done, I’m the master of regrets and over thinking things that cannot be changed, not you. It’s kinda like Roman said, uh, how did he put it... we just have to keep moving forward, one step at a time. Not stuck in one place. Just eat and let’s see where to go from there okay?”

The words rang a dim bell, as though he had heard them somewhere before. Not directly from Roman but in a video perhaps? They certainly sounded like the sort of dramatic, overly optimistic and simplified ideas that Roman would come out with, always with the best of intentions. They made an annoyingly large amount of sense too, and he would like nothing better than to try and put all manner of guilt behind him. 

Still, it was all very well for Virgil to tell him to eat, but Logan didn’t know how to, not when his stomach was still churning so badly, both from the guilt he so desperately tried to will himself to move past and the apparent lack of food within his stomach. Virgil gave him a small, crooked smile and lifted two fingers to his mouth, giving a short but sharp whistle, which made Logan’s head hurt a little. 

The door to his room opened again before he could question Virgil as to what the point of that noise was. Through eyes that were blurred by tiredness - and nothing else, Logan was prepared to admit his folly in a lot of things but to claim that his conversation with Virgil and the ensuring revelations had brought tears to his eyes was simply foolish - he could make out the form of two other people entering his room, Patton first and Roman after. The other bespectacled side appeared be holding a banana for some reason - and was that a pot of some kind of puddling in Roman’s hands? What were they up to now? 

“I asked them to get some food for you to eat, it's fairly bland, it should be easy on your stomach,” Virgil explained, sensing perhaps that Logan would not want to ask and admit that he was unsure of what was going on. 

“Ah.” Logan’s eyes lit up, relieved that at last here was something that made sense, something he understood and could discuss. He was back on _terra firma_ at last. This was something he knew a little about, something he could work with. “Bananas, rice, applesauce and toast. Also known as the BRAT diet. You know recent research no longer supports the idea that such a restrictive diet is beneficial to the recovery of people suffering from illness or malnutrition and that in actual fa-”

“Logan, shut up.” Despite the words, there was a fondness to Virgil’s tone, the anxious side almost smiling at him as he sank down gratefully onto Logan’s bed. “Stop being a brat and eat your food so I can go to sleep.”

Roman handed Logan the pot of applesauce and spoon with a small smile before turning and heading over to sit on the bed beside Virgil. He didn't speak, didn't gloat or crow over the logical sides foolishness, something that Logan was more grateful for than he felt as though he would ever be able to express in words. Instead Roman simply sat next to Virgil, tapping lightly at his side in greeting. Patton placed the banana on the desk in front of him, a soft hum that was nowhere near words as Logan ripped the lid off the pot. His hand lifted and rested lightly on the logical sides shoulder, the warmth and the weight grounding him, a comforting connection to a world he had felt so disconnected from lately. After everything he had done, after the fight and then running away without a word, Patton still offered comfort.

Logan tilted his head back, looking up into eyes that were warm and completely devoid of any pity. After everything Patton knew, he still didn't pity him and that meant the world to Logan. His throat tightened, eyes growing misty once more, at knowing just how deeply Patton had to love him, to give him so much support without despising him.

“Patton... I...” Logan trailed off, the words for the moment escaping him. He was no good at apologies at the best of times, and there was so much he needed to say about this, so much he had to try and recover, think of some way to somehow make it up to him. Logan has no idea where he would even start with such a bewildering and enormous task.

“Are you going to do better now Logan?” Patton asked quietly. Logan frowned slightly at the question and that was not what he had though the moral side would pick as the most pressing thing to focus on. He knew better than to fight him on this kind of thing now, and while he had come to accept that he didn't understand Patton's way of thinking, he was trying to not let it get to him so badly. He was trying to do as the moral side had demanded and be okay with not understanding but simply trust Patton's alternative manner of thinking and doing things.

“Yes. I am... I didn't wish to cause you pain, I would never have destroyed your food had I any idea that you would have been aware of my actions I would never have done something so uncouth.”

Patton squeezed his shoulder, effortlessly silencing him, giving Logan another warm smile.

“Then that's the important thing, that you are going to do better. Words are one thing, something easier than actually changing anything, actions another. I know you can fix this,” Patton assured him and just like that it seemed he had been forgiven. Logan wasn't really sure it would be that simple and some part of him didn't want it to be. He needed to do more... somehow. He needed to prove himself, even if Patton didn't expect it. It wasn't right that Patton didn't expect it, that he thought he didn't need one because Patton deserved it. Sweet, kind, unassuming Patton who he had treated dreadfully and been so forgiving.

There was, perhaps, a lot he had to atone for, a lot of forgiveness to be earnt from a number of people.

Logan glanced over to the bed. Virgil was sat bolt upright, eyes flickering between the food in his hand and Logan himself, still on high alert, still waiting for something to apparently go wrong. It was foolish for Virgil to be so worried when Logan had all but admitted his fault and was now willing to rectify it. Then again, Logan could hardly blame Virgil for doubting his intentions, not with how... out of sorts Logan had been behaving. There was still a chance that he might change his mind yet again and revert to the idea that he didn’t need to eat.

In all honesty, Logan wasn’t completely convinced that his pains were due to a lack of food. He was convinced he was the reasoning behind Virgil not sleeping, and he was convinced now that food was a necessary for the sides as well as Thomas himself in order to keep correctly functioning to the best of their ability. As much as it mentally pained him, he has been... wrong. But could the cure be as simple as simply having a little to eat and work his way back to a regular eating schedule? 

Roman’s warm gaze met his eyes for a second and then dipped down to look at the anxious side sat beside him. He reached out again, fingers returning to tap at his side, a slow but steady pattern that he repeated over and over, trying to calm Virgil. 

After a couple of long, painfully drawn out moments, Virgil gave in to the soft but persistent touches, exhaling and folding himself up against Roman, head rocking to the rest to rest on his shoulder, knees drawn up near his chest. It still looked a little stiff, a little uncomfortable but it was a great improvement over the pose of before. Logan tore his eyes away from the scene on his bed to look back at the pot gripped tightly in his hand. 

He stared down at the open pot of applesauce, trying to stem the wave of sickness that was trying to sweep over him. Logan could do this. It was only a step up from a drink and Logan had been able to handle water. If he just thought of it as having spoonfuls of a slightly thicker drink, a milkshake or something of that ilk. With another deep breath, Logan plunged the spoon into the pot, trying to ignore how badly his hand was trembling as he drew it back out. The hand on his shoulder squeezed again, another wave of warmth and comfort radiating through him. Patton was here. They were all here and nobody was making any comments, nobody was treating him as though he was weak or a joke or anything like that. 

Instead he was just surrounded by unconditional love and support. His gaze blurred further, Logan feeling a trickle of wetness leak out of his eye and go down his cheek. Another embarrassing moment and another one that they were too good to mention, Logan finally swallowing a mouthful of food. Time seemed to move painfully slowly as his throat worked, forcing down mouthful after mouthful. Or perhaps it was the apple sauce that was painful, the pot appearing almost like a TARDIS in that it was far larger on the inside. No matter how many times he dipped the spoon into the pot, the contents never seemed to decrease. It was impossible to know how long he was sat here, almost gagging on the food before spoon finally - finally - scraped against the bottom.

Logan wanted to really cry when the pot was finally empty and dropped carelessly on to his desktop, only for the banana to be slowly pushed into his vision. He had to eat more? He didn’t know if he could eat more. Patton’s hand moved lower, rubbing gentle circles against his back, in between his shoulder blades, the tension draining away with every slow and lazy circuit. 

Perhaps he could eat a little more. 

Bite by painful bite, the banana followed it. Logan still felt sick by the end of it, horribly bloated and uncomfortable. It was far too soon to hope for any positive effects it seemed but he had to hope that they would come. It took roughly twenty minutes for the stomach to realise it had food in it, which was why you could eat and still be hungry. If he was lucky, that was why he was still in pain and so he just needed to wait those twenty minutes out. 

Tomorrow would be another battle. Another internal fight with himself to try and eat despite the pain in his stomach. A fight that would be so much harder with the memory of this pain and he felt utterly drained by the whole thing,. All Logan felt capable of doing now, was sleeping and hopefully sleeping the pain away.

“Um... Logan?” Roman’s stage whisper had him looking back at his bed where the two were seated. Or rather, where they had been seated, because they were no longer in the same positions as before. Virgil was half slumped against Roman, his hands twisted in the sash as though to keep him in place, head on his shoulder. Eyes were finally closed, Virgil’s chest rising and falling in a peaceful manner that sat oddly with the fierce grip he had on the sash. Legs were half dangling off the bed, and it made Logan wonder how hard Virgil had fought to stay awake for as long as he had.

“It’s fine,” Logan replied softly and he would have been heartless indeed to demand that they wake up Virgil or try and move him back to his room. While they could do it, the movement would almost certainly wake him and after being awake for so long, that was the last thing Logan wanted to do to him.

“Slumber party?” Logan offered, voice hesitant, some part of him still waiting for the moment when Patton would realise how cruel he had been and revoke the forgiveness and love offered so freely to him. 

Yet again, he underestimated Patton, yet again he thought too little of that heart and the endless capacity for love. Patton operated on a completely different level to Logan, one that didn't rely on facts, figures or things that made a repeatable kind of sense. It was bewildering, the world that Patton so effortlessly navigated but perhaps it was time for Logan to trust that in those respects, Patton knew exactly what he was doing. He knew how to move through that ever shifting hall of mirrors without touching a single reflective surface, clearly delighted by Logan’s suggestion. Patton bounced a little on his heels, hands lifting to clap them together with excitement before remembering that Virgil was still asleep, freezing rather comically in a half clap pose, palms an inch apart. 

“That sounds like a wonderful idea!” Words were spoken in a hushed whisper to match Roman’s previous tone and out of the corner of his eye, Logan could see the royally clad side nod vigorously in agreement. Not that Roman ever needed much excuse to ever have a sleepover. 

Roman slowly began to shift the pair of them, sliding down onto the bed and drawing Virgil with him. It was a slow progress, every tiny shift of Virgil causing him to freeze, holding his breath until the anxious side stilled once more. He clicked his fingers when the pair of them were finally lying prone, bed elongating until it could easily support four people. The whole room seemed to shift and stretch itself outward, responding to Roman’s changes and striving to keep some semblance of logic and order to the new bed. Such a large bed would never fit in his room and make any kind of sense so of course the room must become larger in order to allow everything to fit correctly.

“Aren't not going to change Virgil’s clothes too?” Patton asked softly, clicking himself into a pair of pyjamas as well, covered in puppies and kitties that normally would have made Logan shudder a little in how loud they were, how Patton was surely only a word or two away from a series of devastating puns that would make Logan’s non existent blood pressure rise sharply. Now, it was rather comforting, this scene of normality. Of course Patton would wear something like that to bed. Of course he would show his love for cats despite being so very allergic to them. 

“Nah, he wouldn't appreciate someone doing that to him while he was asleep and couldn't give his consent,” Roman replied, a fond smile on his face as he thought of it. “He’ll be fine in his hoodie tonight, I’m pretty sure he sleeps in it a lot of the time, the plebeian.” 

“Good point,” Patton said, lifting his hand to absently point towards the pair as he did. Roman was right of course, Virgil would react in a highly negative fashion if he woke up and found himself in a different set of clothing to the ones he had fallen asleep in. Even waking up in a slightly different sized bed, with different people could potentially be cause for concern but the fact it was the three of them should offset any bad feelings he might have.

Patton crawled onto the bed, settling himself next to the pair, Virgil comfortably in the middle. Awake, he would have no doubt started to blush horribly at the focus suddenly being on him once more, on everyone taking the time to settle around him, to curl up close to the one Patton insisted was his ‘dark strange son’. 

It rather pleased Logan, to know that Virgil was in the middle of the sleeping event they had created, that he would be surrounded on all sides by... well... sides. Those that wanted to love and protect him, who wanted to help heal the wounds he had inflicted on himself by not sleeping. Virgil shifted slightly, curling into Patton as a new source of heat from the front, but with his back still pressed up against Roman. It was most unlike Virgil not to wake at any sort of movement, the normally flighty purple clad man would have sat bolt upright by now, torn from sleep by the slighted touch or sound. 

Then again, Virgil had not slept in days now and it stood to reason his normally alert reflexes would be dulled by such deprivation. 

“Logan?” Patton's warm voice broke into his thoughts, the logical side blinking a couple of times as he stared at the moral side and clothing that was starting to burn his eyes a little with how it didn’t quite make sense. Cats should not be that happy looking when they were just floating heads and next to the equally floating heads of their traditional enemy, the dog. “You coming?”

“Oh, of course.” Carefully, Logan climbed to his feet, swaying a little thanks to the movement. He was suddenly so very tired, an added wave of exhaustion coming over him and sleep sounded perfect right now, barely noticing the way in which his stomach had started to ease a little, the pain shifting into something more manageable. He clicked his fingers slowly, shifting into a plain t-shirt and loose fitting pants, suitable bedwear without having to have specific ‘pajamas’. They were still comfortable, they let him sleep and that was all that mattered. Logan lay down next to Patton, suddenly feeling rather silly. They had not had a group sleepover since they were children.

No, that was incorrect.

They had never had a proper group sleepover because those childhood memories were all missing the presence of Virgil. They had never invited Anxiety - Patton had wanted to, but both Roman and Logan had overruled him, Roman out of dislike and Logan out of the cold belief that either Anxiety would not want to sleep with them or, more likely, that his presence would ensure none of them were able to relax. 

Yet another thing to add to his list of times he had been wrong.

Now look at them, all content, all sleeping, Roman and Patton already having drifted off and the stress of the last few days must have weighed heavily on them too, for them to sleep so easily. With Virgil in the middle and Logan should have tried harder to ensure that he had been properly included. Anxiety in the past would have probably said no, but that was partly their fault, for not trying hard enough to include him. They could have saved them all from so much pain, if only Logan had actually used his brain correctly. 

Virgil reached out, apparently still asleep. His arm lifted, brushing over Patton’s chest to rest on Logan’s own, Logan’s anxious thoughts stuttering to a stop at the contact, drawing in a soft, surprised, breath of air. Finger’s twisted into Logan’s pajama top, holding him lightly before exhaling and relaxing once more, although his hand was still attached to Logan, keeping him close. From the way Virgil was lying, his back against Roman, his front again Patton and now his hand on Logan, he could feel all three of the sides, and would know, even in his subconsciousness, that they were there, with him.

Logan had a hypothesis that Virgil was perhaps not as deeply asleep as he would have the rest of them believe. A theory that he was maybe not asleep at all yet but was positioning himself in order to make sure the other three were all on the bed and within his reach, where his brain would tell him they were all safe. A theory that Virgil knew very well what he was doing by holding his top.

Still.

He wasn’t going to test it out to see if he was right or wrong. He didn’t need to know everything. 

Instead, he simply closed his eyes, letting the warmth of the other three seep into cold and aching bones. If his theory was correct, Virgil would doubtless go to sleep now that his worries were soothed by being able to feel all three of them. And if it was incorrect then Virgil was already asleep and so there was no need to worry. There was no need to worry about anything tonight, because he was surrounded by people that cared and wanted to look after him, Logan feeling sleep start to take him. 

At the end of the day, he simply did not like being wrong.

But perhaps it was not so bad, to be wrong occasionally. Not when he had his family to set him back on the correct path.


End file.
